Have you heard of “smishing”? No? Me either, until I listened to this podcast from c|net. Over the last several years, most folks have heard of “phishing”, the attempt by email scammers to get you to click on a link and give up some valuable personal information like bank account numbers, etc.
Smishing is the same attempt, just using SMS messaging. SMS messaging is what most people refer to as text messaging on their mobile phones. According to the video clip, some 30 Million smishing messages are sent worldwide every day. A smishing message will purport to be from a company you do business with and will include a link. The link points to a malicious website that will try to extract your account info.
Your best bet if you receive such a message is to delete it or report it as spam. Forward the message to shortcode 7726 and your cell provider will be alerted that this is a spam message. Messages sent to 7726 are shared with security providers to help prevent spam.
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