01 November 2023
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Phishing or spam? Both are annoying but which one is dangerous?
Spam emails are mass messages offering outrageous bargains, foreign princes, and sudden inheritances. They’re annoying but are rarely dangerous by themselves, and are usually easy to identify and ignore.
Phishing emails are dangerous, insidious, cyber threats. They usually appear to be from a trusted organisation such as a bank or online retailer and can be very sophisticated and difficult to spot. Even simply opening one of these emails can infect your device with malware.
Here’s an example:
This phishing email appears legitimate in many ways:
But it still has many signs of a phishing email:
Note that phishing is not limited to emails. Learn about other types of phishing
The impacts of being phished vary but all are inconvenient at best and very serious at worst. This could include:
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