Phishing Email Campaign Targets Users of Google

Softpedia.com published a recent report revealed by security pundits in third week of December, 2014 stating that a phishing campaign is targeting users of mail service from Google which is masquerading across the Internet during mid December 2014 and targeted innocent patrons of the service.

The email seems to be from the Mail System Administrator at Google and informs that your mailbox is almost full. The email suggests to delete unwanted messages and make free space in the mailbox. The email also informs that alternatively you may click a link to reduce the size of the mailbox to solve the problem.

Footer information suggests that Google sent the email which includes a secondary link which allows you to change what emails you receive from Google+.

However, the email is not from any 'Mail System Administrator' at Google or anywhere else but instead, it is a phishing scam designed to steal your login details of your email account.

If you click any of the links in the email, it will take you to a fraudulent website which hosts a login form that will ask you to sign-in with username and password of your email account.

If you put in all information as requested, it will be sent to the cyber crooks masterminding the scam campaign. Once they get your account credentials, they use it to compromise your account for fake purposes. They also use your email address to send spam or malicious email messages.

Companies address their clients with information entered upon subscribing to the service. Experts note that a vague salutation like "Dear" should definitely ring the alarm.

The most important aspect, in this particular case, is the size of the mailbox itself. Google made sure that its clients would not face this problem. Currently, it offers 15GB of free storage for the cloud, email and Google+ Photos services. Experts observe that the total amount of space used can be checked on the Storage page.

Therefore, if you have already fallen to the trick, then change your account password immediately. You should never click on the link an email is holding in an attempt to sign into your account to avoid getting tricked by these phishing scams.

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