It is an unfortunate fact that I never have difficulty coming up with a new scam or identity theft scheme for each day’s “scam of the day.”  Often, like today, I merely have to go to the inbox of my email account.  Today I found an email where the subject line read “New Video Update” and the message told me that I had a new video update followed by the tantalizing words “This changes everything.”  In case I was still hesitating to click on the link to the video update, the email went on to say “Don’t miss this, will be taking this down ASAP.”  And just in case I was still hesitating, the email ended with a “P.S. Don’t miss this video.”  Well, I will just have to miss the video because if I had clicked on the link, I would have downloaded a keystroke logging malware program that would have enabled the scammer to steal all of the information in my computer and make me a victim of identity theft.

TIPS

As I regularly repeat, never click on links in emails or tweets or Facebook messages or anywhere else you receive a link unless you are absolutely sure it is legitimate.  And even then you have to be extra careful because the source of an email or other message may appear to come from someone you trust, but their account may have been hacked into so that the link actually is coming from a scammer.  The best course of action is not to click on a link unless you have confirmed with the sender that it is legitimate.  Remember, even paranoids have enemies.  By the way, this particular scam didn’t even indicate who was sending the video other than indicating it was sent by “Member Center.”  Member Center of what was not in anyway clear.