For better or worse, our every day reality has changed in light of the COVID-19 pandemic. On the unfortunate side of things, scams and phishing attempts have also evolved alongside. They now adopt a COIVD-19 theme, so those in need of help become more vulnerable to scams and phishing attempts.
Google has shared its findings on these COVID-19-related security risks, as well as ways to keep yourself safe from them. And internet search giant found that there are now 18 million daily malware and phishing attempts related to COVID-19 daily. In addition to that, there are also 240 million spam messages related to the pandemic every day.
These come in many forms too. Some pretend to be health organisations or governments while others sell fake products, pose as fake financial aid, or even ask to donate to fake charities.
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To counter this, Google has also provided a few handy tips to help you identify and avoid falling victim to common scams. Most of them involve being very careful with links that show up in emails. Another useful tip is to copy portions of the email or text to see if they’ve been reported before. Incidentally, this is also a useful tip to check if frequently shared messages are true or have been debunked.
And finally, Google offered more general security tips to keep you safe. One is that you install security updates whenever they are available. And with all the things happening with Zoom, the internet search giant also suggests that you enable security-related settings on video conferencing apps. As for your Google accounts, the company suggests that you run its Security Checkup and Password Checkup to make sure none of your passwords have been compromised.
(Source: Google.// Images: Google – [1],[pdf].)
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