Category: Passwords

We’ve had several questions recently from our customers who have AT&T Yahoo! DSL service, and have received an e-mail about an “Important Security Update” with their e-mail service.

In the e-mail, customers are advised that they if they use an e-mail client (such as Outlook or Outlook Express) they need to change some of their settings in order to continue receiving e-mail. They offer an automatic way of changing the settings via download of their “Self Support Tool”, or you can manually change the settings.

I recommend the manual method. As a service to our customers, I have posted step-by-step instructions with screen shots showing the new settings in Outlook Express.

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According to Wikipedia “phishing” is a form of social engineering, characterized by attempts to fraudulently acquire sensitive information, such as passwords and credit card details, by masquerading as a trustworthy person or business in an apparently official electronic communication, such as an email or an instant message. The term phishing arises from the use of increasingly sophisticated lures to “fish” for users’ financial information and passwords. (Click on the Wikipedia link at the beginning of this paragraph for more information including detailed examples claiming to come from eBay or PayPal). I’ve recently come across a new Phishing scheme that causes a window to pop-up on a computer claiming to be from AOL, and requesting information you should never give out on the internet – such as ATM PIN number. Luckily the customer did the right thing by not filling out the form, called AOL and confirmed that this is a phishing scheme. You can see the official-looking window below.