1. No matter how safe and up to date your computer is, Email will always be the easiest way to get a virus on your computer. Following these simple steps can greatly reduce these risks.
2. Do not open attachments that you are not expecting, even if they appear to be from your friends. Many of the latest Email viruses use a technique known as spoofing that makes it appear that you are receiving an Email from a friend or co-worker, when really it’s from the virus itself. If you are unsure of an attachment being sent to you, contact the person who the Email claims to be from and verify it’s legit before opening it.
3. When you do receive an attachment, choose to download it (or save it to disk) before opening it. With most email applications, you can right click on an attachment and either choosing save as or download attachment. By doing this, you will give your virus scanner a better chance to look over the file before opening it.
4. Beware emails that appear to come from PayPal, Ebay, or your bank. Most of these are false emails known as phishing scams that try to get your personal information. They contain links that appear to be legit, but really direct you to other sites that look just like the real site, but simply gather your information and give the creator of the email all of your bank information. For example, http://www.uwgb.edu looks like it would go to our homepage, but if you click on it, it will send you to Google’s website. If you need to go to your Bank or PayPal or some other site, manually type in the website into your address bar of your web browser instead of clicking on a link inside of an email. If you think you have mistakenly done this in the past, contact your financial institution immediately and tell them.
5. When sending emails to others, make sure the subject line is clear and properly spelled. Also, do not send emails with blank subject lines. This will help prevent spam filters from accidentally marking your email as spam and deleting it.
6. If an email is clearly spam, delete it immediately. Examples of this are Emails that contain explicit subjects or text or other characters that simply does not make sense. Even the act of opening certain emails can be enough to cause damage or direct you to malicious websites. Also, never click unsubscribe links in spam messages if they are provided. They will simply use the information you provide to sign you up for even more spam in the future.