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Campaign highlights dangers
Shady fishing in cyberspace

„If you don’t act immediately, we will block your account!“, or „You’re the lucky winner – get your free iPhone now!“. Quite obviously fakes, right? However, sometimes cyber criminals aren’t as obvious when they try to hack your data. They use sophisticated and well-phrased e-mails to capitalise on the good faith of their victims - and the links in these e-mails are clicked more often than you would think. This is why Heinrich Heine University has started a new campaign to raise awareness of these digital dangers.

A new poster explains the practices used in password phishing. Zoom

A new poster explains the practices used in password phishing. (Poster: HHU)

Recently, posters have been put up at many of the entrances to the larger buildings on campus with the aim to raise awareness of this issue among HHU students and staff. The attacks are happening more and more frequently and the tricks that are used to phish for confidential information are numerous: fake e-mails, bogus websites or dubious posts are used to tap your login credentials. If these schemes are successful, HHU’s whole digital infrastructure is at risk, too.   

Here are some useful tips:
1. Be vigilant: Phishing e-mails nowadays appear to originate from persons or institutions you know. Only when you take a closer look, do you realise that the sender’s address has been changed.  

2. Get help: If you believe that you’ve fallen victim to such an attack, please call the ZIM immediately under 0211 81-10111 or write an e-mail to .

3. Learn about the dangers: in an IT security training members of the university learn how to protect themselves against phishing attempts – knowledge that will also help to make your computer at home more secure.   

You can find a breakdown of the above information and more under www.hhu.de/phishing

Autor/in: Katrin Koster
Kategorie/n: Schlagzeilen, Auch in Englisch, INTRANET News
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