In light of a recent email scam, please remember - if you receive an email that looks like it is from your rector, parish administrator, diocesan staff member, or bishop requesting a “favor” and instructing you to reply, DO NOT REPLY and DELETE IT.
This kind of email scam is known as “phishing," and the request is not likely to be from the actual person. Malicious individuals can create fake email addresses that look almost identical to the address of the person they're attempting to imitate. These messages are meant to look real, and can even be accompanied with accurate profile photographs, using publicly available images.
Ways to verify an email include:
- Confirm that the sender’s email address matches their display name by opening the email in a computer, then hovering your cursor over the “From” email address.
- Double-check that the email address matches one they have used to communicate with you in the past or that you may have saved in your Contact List.
- Pay attention to mistakes or misspelled words in the body of the email. For example, the wrong name being signed at the bottom of the email.
If you receive a similar email, asking for an urgent favor or errand without any detail in the initial message, and you are still unsure whether the request is legitimate:
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Call the person being impersonated to confirm whether the request is legitimate.
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Do not reply to the email; mark it as Spam or Junk, and delete it.
The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and other organizations report that imposter scams like this one have been on the rise in recent years, taking advantage of public trust in religious leaders and increasingly available tools for creating a fake email account. The expert consensus is that the best way to combat these gift card scams is to learn how to recognize them, to notify the person being impersonated, and to report the fraudulent email to the provider (i.e. Gmail, Yahoo, etc.). The FTC also has an online complaint assistant, at www.ftccomplaintassistant.gov, especially if gift cards have been purchased.
Please consider sharing this reminder with church staff members or congregation members who may be unaware of these kinds of email scams. Especially while churches may not be meeting regularly in-person, it is important to remind everyone what kind of communications and requests they can expect from their priest, their church, and the diocese to help them identify when an email is suspicious.
Please note that Bishop Reed will not ask anyone to "run an errand" for him or purchase gift cards in this manner.
For assistance or questions, you may email [email protected], or call the diocesan office at (210) 824-5387.
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