US Post Office Issues Alert about Phishing E-mail

The US Postal Service has asked residents of South Carolina (USA) to watch out for a familiar e-mail scam hitting users' inboxes in a new form.

The e-mail, purporting to be from William R. Galligan Chief Postal Inspector, informs the recipient that a packet for him from DHL hasn't been received due to security reasons. Further, the post office's scanner has found an ATM card inside the packet, which carries a credit worth $1.5 Million, the e-mail notifies

Thereafter, the e-mail suggests that the packet can be forwarded to the recipient if he pays for an affidavit, valuing 89 Euros, from Spain. The e-mail even provides an e-mail ID where the recipient can transfer the payment.

Justin Crooks, PIO for the US Postal Inspection Service, Charlotte Division, said that the scam wasn't new, as reported by counton2 during the 4th week of December 2009. Crooks said that the scam was a fresh twist to the traditional "advance fee" fraud. Nevertheless, he added that it wasn't normal to find fraudsters using the name of the Chief Postal Inspector to trap a prey in their scam.

The security researchers state that phishing e-mails of this kind has been around since people started using the Internet for commercial purposes. Scammers who have become more advanced over time have launched the above fraudulent campaign through a subtle change in the traditional Nigerian e-mail scam. In fact, the scam has been reappearing with different subjects from time-to-time.

Consequently, to lessen such e-mail scams, computer users should adopt certain precautionary steps, state the specialists. These are using secure passwords (a minimum of six characters), while the recommended length of a password is eight or more characters. It is also necessary that the users should change passwords regularly.

In addition, users should never reveal their account details or personal information to anyone who asks for them through e-mail unless verifying the authenticity of the e-mail. anti-spam filters should be installed on computers to ward off spam mails. Finally, when users close their e-mail account, they should log out systematically, the specialists advise.

Related article: US Passes Baton to Asia in Spam Relay

» SPAMfighter News - 1/5/2010