Online scammers may attempt to phish you for information. By identifying the most common features of phishing messages, you protect yourself against fraud. Often, a scam...
Raises fear or worry. The criminal may try to make you believe that a fraud has been discovered and your account or card is frozen. This is worrisome to anyone who takes their finances seriously. A distressed person is easier to defraud.
Creates a sense of urgency. The message may tell you to act quickly. Never rush things if you receive such a message.
Warns you that you may lose money, mail or important documents. The scammer may claim that you are about to receive money or a shipment from an online store, for example. The next step in the scam is asking you to log in to your online bank or provide personal information. Never do anything you are asked to do by such messages.
Uses poor grammar. Strange characters, spelling errors, and unusual sentence structures often, but not always, indicate fraud. Of course, a single spelling error does not mean that the sender is a criminal. Look at the message as a whole.
Links to your online bank login page. The bank will never ask you to log in to your online bank from a link. Never click on links to login pages.
If you receive a phishing message, do not click on any links. Report the message to us and delete it.
Please remember these seven things when you do banking online
- Do not go to an online bank through the link you have received or a search engine. The message directing you to the login page is scam. You may end up in a scam website through Google, Bing or another search engine too, so type the address on the browser’s address bar.
- Check the address. Always make sure that you are at www.op.fi. Do not enter your identifiers into a site if you are not sure about its legitimacy.
- Keep your user ID and password to yourself. The bank will never ask you to provide your user ID over the phone or by SMS or email.
- Do not open email or SMS attachments sent in the bank’s name. Verify that the attachments are genuine with your bank’s customer service.
- If a person you don’t know asks you to install an application, do not do so. Install the software you need yourself through an app store of your device.
- Do not confirm transactions you aren’t certain you have made yourself. Always read the confirmation requests with due care – if there is anything that does not match, do not confirm anything.
- Please ask in case of doubt. If the contact or message is suspicious, please contact your own bank before you do anything else.