Ever gotten an email that had an attachment ending in .html or .htm? Those file extensions indicate web pages, meaning if you click you’ll be taken to an external site. Any such attachments should be viewed with caution, since you might not know where they lead. Don’t click if possible. If applicable, ask the sender […]

If you’re worried about someone having access to your Gmail because you forgot to log out of a shared computer or notice some unusual activity, there’s a simple fix. At the very bottom of the Gmail web app, you should see some text about “account activity” alongside a clickable link. Following that link will take […]

Many services require account verification via email or another channel. Unfortunately, scammers have exploited this setup, most famously in a series of phishing emails claiming to be from Amazon. Carefully read every email and look for the tell-tale signs of a scam, including typos, lengthy sender email addresses and urgent calls to action.

Say you receive an email that has typos and asks you to do something risky like visit a strange site. You click “unsubscribe,” thinking you’ll be spared any such communications in the future. In reality, you might become more vulnerable by doing so. The safest route is to simply delete the message, or blacklist its […]

If you’re sending an email or quickly checking a website on a PC or Mac, do so from a non-administrator account. That way, if something goes wrong, the permissions available to the attacker or malware will be much less extensive, stemming the potential damage.

Providing your email address to a website is often a necessary step for setting up an account. To reduce the amount of mail you receive and avoid phishing more generally, consider using a dedicated email address separate from your personal account. For forums or other quick and non-vital signups, a burner email address might be […]