Smishing – What you need to know

What is Smishing?

Smishing is a form of phishing, smishing is when someone tries to trick you into giving them your private information via a text or SMS message. Smishing is becoming an emerging and growing threat in the world of online security. Read on to what smishing is and how you can protect yourself against it.

According to Experian, a credit reporting bureau in the U.S., smishing is yet another tool used by cybercriminals to obtain personal information and steal identities. You’ve probably heard of ‘phishing,’ which is an attempt to get people to provide sensitive information via email, like credit card numbers or passwords. Smishing is a mashup of SMS (short message service) and phishing.

Basically, it’s phishing via text. The fraudsters use malware to send an SMS, and once someone downloads the link, the malware is activated, tricking people into sharing sensitive information.

What are some examples of popular smishing scams?

We’ve all heard of the phishing scams like “I’m a prince and I want to wire $10 million to you, all I need is your bank account information,” or “If you click this link you will get rich quick!” But these SMS scam messages can be more difficult to spot.

Another example might be a text saying that if you fail to click on the link and provide personal information, whatever company they’re pretending to be will start charging daily for the service. Delete these immediately.

How can you disrupt fraudsters trying to smish you?

I spoke to Rod Griffin, director of public education at Experian, and he suggests treating your phone like a PC. On a PC, you have antivirus software to prevent fraudsters gaining access to your computer. Since your phone does pretty much everything your PC does, if not more, why not purchase antivirus software for that as well? Don’t let the fraudsters out-tech you. And, of course, never click on suspicious links that come in via text.

To make sure you haven’t been recently smished, check your credit report regularly to see if any suspect accounts have been opened in your name.