Position your brand to be the hunter, not the hunted
Every year around this time, phishing gets competitive. Phishing– not fishing– scurrilous schemes to trick people for paying for products and services they didn’t order, and the river of fish becomes more and more plentiful each season.
The river is the Internet and, if you’re an online consumer, you’re exposed to at least 2.5 phishing attempts per day. If your brand hosts an ecommerce site that number scales exponentially.
I’m not sure how many scams the average VFC ecommerce site prevents on a daily basis but it’s considerable enough to spurn me to write about one of them. The tricks become more sophisticated as phishing methods evolve.
When VFC builds and hosts an ecommerce site for a client partner, we implement layers of protection and monitor sites for various methods of fraud. So, each site is fairly inoculated against online scamming but, still, experienced phisermen find new ways to attract prey… and some of the techniques are perfectly legal.
For instance, because domain registrations are public information unless registrants pay an exorbitant private registration fee, an outfit called Domain Registry is able to send solicitations for renewal through the US mail.
In some instances, the domain in question is not even associated with the brand’s physical mailing address but still, Domain Registry is able to cross reference databases to get their ersatz invoice to the business owner.
Every year, VFC gets a few clients questioning this piece of mail– we just had two today– and we alert them of the phishing scam but have to wonder, how many business owners are just paying this rather nominal invoice in the rush of holiday AP and AR? It makes it even more confusing that this particular deception adds VFC’s name above the client’s.
So, as a public service announcement, if you receive a Number 10 from Domain Registry please check with your current domain name registrar, host or IT provider prior to swallowing the missive hook, line and sinker.
If your company website is currently hosted by VFC then, rest assured, we have taken every precaution to keep your brand safe and secure online. From trademark facilitation and password protected assets to security certificates and secure payment gateways, VFC has a 21 year record of keeping client brands safe online.
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Backed by years of solid agency experience, VFC is an innovative and energetic team of award-winning copywriters, designers, illustrators and programmers prepared to grow your brand and your business. VFC delivers strategic marketing, advertising and public relations campaigns for a diverse roster of clients from a 170-year-old, high-tech renovated farmhouse in the heart of Chester County, Pennsylvania. For more information call 877-GROW ART or visit VFC on the web at www.virtualfarm.com.
