A friend asked me to check out an email that was sent to him. It says somebody sent him a package or was that a bank draft of a large sum of money. And the company was asking for my friend’s personal information. I told him, it’s a fraud!

Criminals took advantage of the world wide web as we are now in the Internet Age. Online fraud is very popular nowadays. Phony email messages and scheming web sites are powerful tools for these crooks. They will trick you to give out your financial or personal information and use them in many possible ways for their financial gain.

You might be entice to reply to an email message that says somebody has left you a fortune. And you might think that you won’t lose anything since the email’s not asking you to send them money. But without realizing the severity of your answer email, you have already given them your name, address, phone number, birthdate, and bank account numbers. These information they can and will use to apply for and get credit in your name, max out your credit cards, or empty a bank account.

Phishing sites are fake websites. They often use real organization’s name and logo. They will trick you to submit your personal information by making you answer application or sign-up forms. And they will surely get hold of your email address and passwords, which could be very useful to them.

Before getting excited, you have to ask yourself some questions. Who would send you a large amount of money? Why would a stranger entrust millions of dollars to you? If you can’t give a logical answer to these questions then you’re facing a fraudulent scheme waiting for you to fall into their plot.

And these are ways to avoid phisher sites and online fraud:

Never reply to e-mail messages that request your personal information
Don’t click links in suspicious e-mail
Use strong passwords and change them often
Don’t send personal information in regular e-mail messages
Do business only with companies you know and trust
Make sure the Web site uses encryption
Help protect your PC
Monitor your transactions
Use credit cards for transactions on the Internet instead of a debit card