A common tactics in the phishing scammer's playbook is to create a sense of urgency. Among other things, it can force the recipient to stop thinking clearly. Because the sender (who is often posing as a boss or supervisor) appears to be in a rush, the recipient can feel pressured to do as the scammer asks. 

Fortunately, in the real-life case I was alerted to below, the recipients were security aware and did not fall into the popular trap. 

RED FLAG WARNING:  As you can see in the screenshot below, the person posing as me was not using my real email address. That is a huge red flag. 

Keep in mind that anyone can associate any name to any email they send. The person who is being spoofed has virtually no control over this. I've had many people with good intentions contact me over the years to say, "You've been hacked! You need to change your password!" However, a spoofed message has nothing to do with a compromised password. It's nothing I, nor anyone else who has gotten impersonated, could have prevented.

Never rely on the name; always verify the email address. If you're unsure, contact the sender to check as my friend did here. Better safe than sorry! 

Facebook never ceases to raise data security and privacy concerns. They give us something new to talk about seemingly every day. Here's a few eyebrow-raising moments from recent months. 

Instagram passwords not protected: Facebook, which owns Instagram, admitted  millions of Instagram passwords were stored in plain text on its servers, making them accessible to employees. There are several things you can do to protect yourself. Check out my advice in a recent Bustle article.

No more Moments: Any Facebook users who may have been relying on the Moments feature to archive their histories will soon be out of luck. This is an excellent reminder to never rely on any one feature, technology, device or provider to maintain your memories. If you print photos, print doubles and store them in a second location. If you only have digital copies, have back ups, also stored in separate locations. 

Why am I seeing this post? A new feature from Facebook will allow users to view a list of variables that explain how their past interactions on the site lead to News Feed's prioritizing some posts over others. This is a decent first step towards more transparency from Facebook as to how it uses behavioral data. That said, it will be interesting to see how much they actually disclose when this is put into practice. 

I finally got around to opening a holiday gift that arrived late from China. It was an angel nightlight that could also play music from a nearby Bluetooth device.  

In the package was a USB cord and instructions (written in Chinese only) to plug the nightlight into a laptop computer. However, to turn the light on, you needed to have an app, which the instructions directed me to download using a QR code. 

Against my better judgement (curiosity got the better of me), I scanned the QR code, got the URL and then typed the URL into my phone's browser. It took me to a Chinese-language website that Google wouldn't translate. 

I got a bad feeling and stopped. Did I do the right thing, or do you think chances are good it would have been safe for me to download the app and plug in the nightlight?

First, great job NOT connecting a device you didn't trust into your computer. More people need to listen to that gut instinct. 

Second, your concerns around the technology's country of origin are understandable, given all the media attention around the topic. And, it's great to know you are aware of the risks in general. 

The details you shared are definite red flags, and you did the right thing. One other step you may consider next time is checking the URL's safety by entering it into a URL security checker before visiting the actual site. A couple of good ones are safeweb.norton.com and zulu.zscaler.com, both of which will tell you if the URL is safe, based on their analytics, before you visit. 

Overall, great job heeding the warning sides and erring on the safe side. A nightlight is certainly not worth the potential risks to your personal data and privacy.

I'd like to ask a question of my own relevant to the above... 

To my readers in China, what do you think about the concerns around technology originating from your country? Are the growing global perceptions around Chinese technology accurate? Please share your perspective by emailing me at [email protected].