While it does happen all year long, the frequency of fraudulent text messages that appear to be from the United States Postal Service tends to increase during the Christmas season when more people are mailing packages around the country– and around the world.
John Hyatt with the Postal Service says “smishing” is when scammers send a fake text message– or messages– to smartphones asking users to click on a link to resolve a delivery problem with a pending package. He warns personal data is what the sender is after.
“Basically criminals trying to obtain personally identifying information about a person, such as accounts, user names, passwords, dates of birth, credit card numbers – things like that.”
Smishing texts can be relentless, but Hyatt says NEVER, ever follow the message prompts.
“When you get a suspicious text message, if you click on those links, it will take you to a website that could be downloading onto your phone, and once you submit that information then they use it for nefarious purposes.”
Hyatt says you will only receive text messages from the U.S. Postal Service if you have gone online and registered for that service.
“You can sign up to receive text messages about a tracking number or you can go into the tracking service and put the number in and then ask for text-message updates or even an email update on ‘usps.com.'”
Hyatt says the Postal Service’s “informed delivery” program is being used by millions of Americans to receive legitimate messages about what packages are on the way.
Find more information at usps.com.
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