INFORMATION: Phishing Emails

INFORMATION: Phishing Emails

We will never ask you to enter your University username or password in anything other than an official University login page.

What is happening?

Recently, there have been some examples of phishing emails targeted at the University and the UK academic community.   Such emails copy components of genuine emails and may appear to come from real support staff.  They often use a link that appears to be genuine but on further investigation is just a clever fake. 

If you receive such an email please do not respond to the email and delete it immediately.  It will not be a genuine email from the University of Aberdeen.  If you click on any links it contains or reply, your computing account and email could be compromised and you could potentially receive thousands of SPAM messages. 

A recent example of this type of phishing email is given below:

phishing-example

This is NOT a genuine email.

What should you do?

We have in the past produced information on how to spot a phishing email and you can find out more by visiting this University website http://www.abdn.ac.uk/dit/student/news/index_1750.php

Please be on your guard for phishing emails, future ones could appear to come from University of Aberdeen support staff.  Phishing emails are designed to maliciously harvest personal details from you to either compromise your email account or gain access to other personal data, such as banking details. 

IT Services or any genuine service would never send such unsolicited emails to you, requesting that you reply with password details.  If in doubt, always contact the service directly they will always provide another method of communication.   If you have already responded to one of these emails and provided personal information, please change your password immediately and contact the IT Service Desk.

 

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