There's a great list over at McAfee about the 12 most popular Christmas scams out there, and some of them might seem pretty self-explanitory, but people still manage to fall for them.  Here's one to wet your whistle, and you can check out the rest of them by clicking here!

Charity Phishing Scams - Many popular charitable organizations encourage consumers to think of others during the holiday season through emails asking for year-end donations. In fact, according to McAfee’s recent holiday survey, almost 30% of US consumers plan to donate online this year.

Unfortunately, hackers also know consumers are in the giving spirit during the holidays and prey on their generosity through fake charity phishing emails.

Here’s how it works: The hackers send fictional emails that appear to be from well known charitable organizations, such as the Red Cross, the Salvation Army, and Oxfam that direct consumers to fake websites designed to steal their money. The websites are generally very professional with a fairly high amount of graphical content and a good amount of verbiage designed to make the reader feel upset or guilty. Sometimes the layout and content of these fraudulent sites are copied directly from legitimate charity websites with simply a name and a logo changed.

To determine if an organization’s site is legitimate, go directly to their Website to donate. Don’t ever click on a link sent in email. To learn more about phishing, visit www.mcafee.com/advice.

Posted at 08:26PM Dec 30, 2008 by Kevin P McAuliffe in Inform  |  Comments[0]