Avoiding Common Internet Scams

Posted: July 25th, 2022
Updated: December 30th, 2024

Managing your personal finances online has never been more popular. Unfortunately, this also paves the way for online scammers to take advantage of unsuspecting targets. Read on for tips on how to keep your personal information—and your cash—safe!

Common Scams

A list of a few common online scams can be found below. This is not a complete list of all online scams, but includes methods that a scammer may use in an attempt to deceive you as a customer of 3D Financial. To guard against these common scams, see 'Ways to Protect Yourself' below.

Scam: Spoofing

Spoofing refers to a scammer who has disguised their email address to make you believe that you are in contact with a trusted source, such as a company that you have done business with. The scammer will try to manipulate you into disclosing personal or financial information, usernames, passwords, or other sensitive information.

Scam: Phishing

Phishing scams use spoofing techniques to trick you into visiting a fraudulent website. You may receive an email that appears to be from a trustworthy business address asking you to update or verify your personal information by clicking a link. You will then be directed to a website that looks extremely similar to one you may have visited before and asked to enter personal information such as passwords, credit card numbers, or PINs, etc. Once entered, the scammer has stolen your information.

Scam: Payment Confirmation

The scammer will send an email using spoofing techniques or may even call you to request confirmation of a payment. They will pretend to be from a bank or business and will request sensitive information, such as account numbers or passwords, in order to gain access to your finances.

Ways to Protect Yourself

• Companies generally will not ask you for your username or password, especially via email. If you receive an email or phone call asking for your username or password, do not give out your information. Look up the company’s phone number on your own and call to ask if the request in legitimate.
• If you suspect a link in an email that you received may not be legitimate, hover your cursor over the sender’s email address or the suspected link. The hovering cursor will reveal the full email address or URL which you can then carefully examine. In some cases, the email address may appear legitimate, but the action link may lead you to a site that is illigitemate. This happens when the scammer is utilizing what are known as homographs to imitate the URL of the target company. Using the same hover trick may help in these situations as well. Avoid clicking suspicious links. 
• Set up two-factor authentication on accounts that allow it. This means that, even if a scammer gains access to your password, they will not be able to log in without additional credentials, such as a secondary password, text message code, etc.

3D Financial will never ask you for your personal login information. We will also never use rude, abrasive, or pushy language. If you ever suspect that something is amiss, please do not hesitate to message us or give us a call. Our goal is to ensure that you are comfortable and confident when working with us!