National Consumer Protection Week - Feb 4-10, 2007 - AKA Don’t get Phished!

Posted on February 5, 2007
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The FastPivot/Ydesigns team take the opportunity of National Consumer Protection Week (February 4-10, 2007) to help educate consumers and merchants alike on how not to get Phished!

We noticed that PayPal is helping promote National Consumer Protection Week this week and decided to focus in February on helping make the Internet community a better and safer place for shoppers and merchants alike. After all, it is the month of Valentines and love and all that. Since we love our online merchant clients and their shopping customers, perhaps this small educational effort will help create peace, love, and understanding in the world with the same redemptive power the Coke Commercials had in the Super Bowl. This is the first of a few articles we will post in The FastPivotBlog will phocus on phishing. First you may ask-What is “phishing”? Well, webopedia defines it as:

phishing ?(fish?ing) (n.) The act of sending an e-mail to a user falsely claiming to be an established legitimate enterprise in an attempt to scam the user into surrendering private information that will be used for identity theft. The e-mail directs the user to visit a Web site where they are asked to update personal information, such as passwords and credit card, social security, and bank account numbers, that the legitimate organization already has. The Web site, however, is bogus and set up only to steal the user’s information. For example, 2003 saw the proliferation of a phishing scam in which users received e-mails supposedly from eBay claiming that the user’s account was about to be suspended unless he clicked on the provided link and updated the credit card information that the genuine eBay already had. Because it is relatively simple to make a Web site look like a legitimate organizations site by mimicking the HTML code, the scam counted on people being tricked into thinking they were actually being contacted by eBay and were subsequently going to eBay’s site to update their account information. By spamming large groups of people, the “phisher” counted on the e-mail being read by a percentage of people who actually had listed credit card numbers with eBay legitimately.

Now we are even seeing an epedimic of ambitious automated phishers submitting into lead capture forms and discussion forums simply to get valid email addresses. (Imagine getting phished to your pager!) More to come tomorrow, follow our blog to be safe online and to sell well online!

How Netzians can protect themselves from phishers, scammers and other unscrupulous merchants.
How reputable e-merchants can help communicate their track records of trust and reliability and thus increase their bottom line.

Ecommerce professionals recognize the challenges to online security and shopping hurt our clients bottom lines in reduced conversion rates and slowed sales growth. There are things merchants can do to help assure shoppers their information is secure and to build trust. Small increases in trust and consumer confidence in eretail sites can account for large increases in conversion rates and thus, revenue.

We are considering two upcoming webinars subject to client demand, they are:

How E-retailers and E-MERCHANTS can grow their bottom line by building confidence and trust and thus reducing shopper anxiety.
CONSUMERS-DON’T GET PFISHED! GUARDING AGAINST INTERNET-FRAUD TIPS TO SHOP ONLINE SAFELY

If you are interested in either of these online webinars email katherine (at) ydesigns.com for more details!