Amazon issues warning for Prime Members of account hacks

Happy Friday This past week Amazon issued a warning to all 200 million Prime customers that attackers are striking hard to compromise our accounts. Here’s what you need to know and do.

What's happening:

• Scammers are sending fake emails claiming your Amazon Prime subscription will automatically renew for an unexpected, higher price.

• The scammers may include some personal information about you (obtained from other sources) to come off as legitimate.

• These emails may include a "cancel subscription" button that takes you to a fake look-alike Amazon login page.

The Takeaway In the weeks leading up to Amazon's recent Prime Day, more than 120,000 fake Amazon domains and look-alike web pages were set up by scammers, presumably to take advantage of the event. The bad guys want to take over Prime accounts and they are succeeding. Here are 6 tips to help keep you safe from these new Amazon impersonation scams:

1. Verify purchases on Amazon. If you receive a message about the purchase of a product or service, do not respond to the message or click on any link in the message. Instead, log into your Amazon account or use the Amazon mobile app and confirm that it is really in your purchase history.

2. Trust Amazon’s app and website. Amazon will not ask for payment over the phone or email, only in their mobile app, website or in one of their physical stores. They will never call and ask you to make a payment or bank transfer on another website.

3. Be wary of false urgency. Scammers often try to create a sense of urgency to persuade you to do what they’re asking.

4. Don’t be pressured into buying a gift card. Amazon will never ask you to purchase a gift card, and no legitimate sale or transaction will require you to pay with gift cards.

5. Contact Amazon. If you’re ever unsure, it’s safest to stop engaging with the potential scammer and contact Amazon directly through the Amazon app or website. Do not call numbers sent over text or email, or found in online search results. Remember Amazon will not ask you to download or install any software to connect with customer service nor will we request payment for any customer service support.

6. Check what others are saying. See if anyone else has reported a similar situation. Amazon has partnered with the Better Business Bureau to provide consumers a searchable Scam Tracker that enables you to search suspicious communications reported by others by email, URL, phone number, and more.

If you have received any correspondence (email, text messages, social media messages) that you think might not be from Amazon, please report it immediately. You can use the Amazon self-service tool or email reportascam@amazon.com.

Speaking up gives Amazon vital information they can use to identify bad actors and take action against them. Let's do our part to help fight these bad guys!

Stay safe out there. -Attila

The Positivity Box

A suspected administrator of the notorious Russian-language cybercrime forum XSS was arrested in Ukraine on July 22nd. The operation was a joint effort between Ukrainian authorities, French police, and Europol. The arrested individual had allegedly pocketed over $7M from numerous illicit cybercrime and ransomware activities. A big thanks to European law enforcement for taking down another bad actor stealing from our community.

New Friday Funnies!

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Why don't skeletons fight each other?

They don't have the guts!

What do you call it when someone falls face first into a shrub? 

A face plant.

Where does a general keep his armies?

In his sleevies.

Did you know that French fries aren't actually fried in France?

They're fried in grease!