When responding to an email or clicking a link, most people don’t think twice. Sending emails has become so common that users rarely consider the danger of phishing and other fraudulent activity. But those who are unaware of the threat are at an even greater risk, and it will likely be too late for them to take action by the time that they notice the problem. The key to avoiding this trap is to educate yourself and to remain vigilant at all times. Although disregarding safety for convenience is becoming common, it’s a pitfall that can have a lasting impact on anyone’s future.

Phishing is the process of posing as another person or as a company to deceive people into giving their personal information away, and criminals have been known to use emails as a way to reach their goals. Knowing about the threat is not always enough when your task is to keep yourself and your bank account safe, and the attack can occur at any time.

A user will be checking their email as they would on any other day. Suddenly, the user spots an email from the bank that asks the user to log in to the account to confirm a recent transaction. But the email was not from the bank, and the user’s information is now in the hands of an identity thief. If you don’t want to encounter this situation, then the following information will help.

 

Don’t Share Sensitive Information Through Email

In a common phishing attack, a criminal will pretend to be someone whom you trust to steal sensitive data. The email could appear as though it had been sent by a friend, boss or business contact, and you might be asked for your account information or pin number. But no credible business will request sensitive data in an email, so the request should be your first red flag.

Rather than sending personal details in an email, pick up your phone and call the company or the individual who requested the information. Although this step might seem a little time-consuming, it can save you from a lot of trouble.

 

Manually Navigate to Web Addresses

Long before sending you a fraudulent email, experienced criminals will put in the effort to clone the website of a bank or business. They will then send an email posing as your bank or another trusted entity, and you will be encouraged to click a link that will take you to a malicious website.

Although the content, logo and other details might appear identical to the real thing, any information that you send will be exposed. Avoiding this type of attack is not difficult. Simply open a separate web browser and manually navigate to the website that you intend to visit.

 

Look for Spelling Errors

Keep in mind that phishing attacks can come from any location on the planet, so a lot of fake emails are sent by those who don’t speak English as their first language. When someone from another country sends a fraudulent email, the message will often contain obvious spelling errors. Some people dismiss the spelling errors that they find, but they will likely have their personal information stolen as a result. Customer service agents can make mistakes, but using caution is the best way to avoid becoming a victim.

Also, even criminals who speak English fluently can make mistakes when typing an email. If you notice anything that seems odd, call the company or person from whom the email appears to originate and ask for verification. If the email is not legitimate, report it as spam and block the domain.

 

Don’t Trust Attachments

Downloading and running email attachments is a good way to get a virus or to have other malicious software installed on your device. In the past, hackers would use screen savers and free games to infect their victims, but hackers can even use Word and Excel documents to inflict damage. After a computer is infected, the malicious code will sometimes automatically email itself to everyone in the victim’s address book. If you want to avoid this problem, never download an attachment that you were not expecting.

 

Having your identity stolen can destroy your credit score, and some people are forced to wait years before they can reverse the damage. Nobody should overlook the threat of phishing, and you can never eliminate the risk entirely. But you can significantly reduce the odds of having your personal information exposed by keeping safety at the front of your mind. Protecting yourself will require some time and effort, but safeguarding your information is always easier than trying to pick up the pieces after an incident occurs. Those who focus on security when communicating online will follow these tips, but they will also use common sense to detect the signs of suspicious activity.

 

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How many times have you suffered through the embarrassment of a missed appointment or a deadline? How many times have you forgotten an important file for a business meeting? Nothing makes an employee look worse than being unprepared. It is a huge challenge keeping up with the lightning pace of business when your tools, reminders and data are floating all over the electronic ether. As someone with her fair share of ADD and a penchant for doing a million things at once, I can attest to the personal toll my unconsolidated data storage habits have taken on my sanity and professional development. For these reasons and more, TurnKeyMail has been a game changer.

I’ve tried appointment books, wall calendars, outlook tasks, desktop schedulers, post-it notes on my bathroom mirror—I’ve even tied a literal string around my literal finger and forgotten what it was there for. For a girl who wants to make it in the IT industry, being scattered is a fatal flaw. Enter: TurnKeyMail.

Yes, I’m a TurnKey Internet employee, and it is possible that my loyalties are somewhat biased, but I can’t underestimate how much easier my life has become with all of my business files, appointments, projects and correspondence in one place. It’s kind of like having a personal assistant keeping track of me. In the same way that a mail search function allows you to be totally disorganized and still find things, TurnKey Mail’s follow-up flagging, email and task linking and file storage allow you to keep every appointment, deadline and file in order and ready at a moment’s notice.

The word of the day is “synchronization.” Sure, everyone is talking about the cloud but how many people do you know who are actually seamlessly synchronized—computer to phone to iPod to iPad to Outlook to server? By synchronized, I don’t just mean online. Plenty of people with smartphones can check email via a web browser, but can they access their files? Can they pull up that video presentation from their home computer and that excel file from their work computer and that css file from their server, from wherever they may be, anytime? Are they going to be reminded, simultaneously, by their phone, ipod, home computer and work computer about that Monday morning meeting they scheduled three months ago?

Technology is supposed to make our lives easier. It is supposed to protect us from our own human frailties, make us more efficient, faster, more agile, less responsible for keeping every detail in our brains every second. So much of the time technology has the exact opposite effect—it makes our lives more confusing, scattered, broken and frustrating. The whole mission of TurnKey Internet is to make life easier, to make business easier. A TurnKey solution is a ready-made, all-in-one, user-friendly solution, not just another technological road-block. For me, TurnKeyMail has truly lived up to its name. It has made my life easier. It has made me more efficient. Above all, it has done what technology is supposed to do: step in to help with the things we find difficult. Now I can focus on the things I’m good at instead of stressing over the things I’m not.

Watch the TurnKey Mail Video:

Learn more about TurnKey Mail

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We could not be more excited to announce the arrival of our new email marketing software, TurnKey Newsletter! TurnKey Newsletter is going to change the way our clients do business. There are about a million incredible features (which I will get into below) but most important of all is the ability this software provides to learn about your customers—from how they read your emails to their shoe size—seriously. The better you know your customers, the better you can target your products and services to their needs, and the more successful your business will become.

TurnKey Newlsetter and Your Bottom Line: A One-to-One Ratio

Sometimes you can hear something a million times and you still need to hear it again. For example, you know you’re supposed to drink eight glasses of water every day. You hear it on T.V. You read it in the paper. But do you do it? I sure don’t. It’s the same thing for email marketing. Everyone talks about how important it is—how dramatically it can improve profit, how much it affects customer retention and customer trust—yet so many companies still haven’t started doing it. Part of the reason is that it’s intimidating. What solution do you choose? Will you be able to figure out how to use it? I think many businesses are reluctant to try something new that they don’t fully grasp, especially when they are worried about alienating customers or being called spammers. That is why TurnKey Newsletter is so incredibly exciting. It could not be easier to use!

TurnKey Newsletter: Overflowing with Top-of-the-Line Features

TurnKey Newsletter includes beautiful, professional design templates, an easy what-you-see-is-what-you-get editor, CAN-spam compliant automation (so you don’t get flagged, and your emails get through), email feedback and surveys (so you know what your customers are thinking), and personalization options (so every email is addressed personally—as if you sent each one individually). You can read more about all of the features here: http://turnkeynewsletter.com.

TurnKey Newsletter’s Emails: Always Look the Way You Designed Them

One of the things we are most proud of with TurnKey Newsletter is its compatibility with every major email client out there. Many email marketing products look great at first glance—you can edit templates, add images, and personalize just fine—but when your customers actually open your email, it looks nothing like the email you designed. Text is too big, images get resized, code is visible—it’s a complete mess. Your customers aren’t going to think, “hmm, wow, their email marketing software sucks,” they’re going to think, “hmm, wow, this company is incredibly unprofessional and I don’t think I should be trusting them with my business.” It’s sad, and it’s true. Don’t stake your reputation on a shoddy email marketing tool.

Trust TurnKey Newsletter. Really. It rules.

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