What is Phishing? When you logged in to Ebay today, you were asked for your ID and password. But imagine if you were actually not in an ebay page- Imagine that you entered your user ID and password to some webstite that just LOOKS like ebay. A website that was built to look like ebay to fool people and steal their personal information. This is Phishing. You think you are on some website, either ebay, paypal, your email website, or whatever- but you are actually in a site that looks remarkably similar.

You might be thinking: I am never going to fall into one of those "Phishing" Scams, I an too smart for that!

Well, Phishers are getting cleverer and cleverer, and people keep falling for this every day- that's why phishers are still at it. This guide will provide you with some tips on how to avoid falling victim to phishing and getting your personal information stolen.

First thing to remember: Ebay , paypal, banks, and many other respected sites will NEVER ask for personal information via email. If you received information asking you for your information such as your password, your mothers maiden name, or other information DO NOT REPLY NO MATTER HOW REAL THE EMAIL LOOKS AND IF YOU SEE THE LOGO THERE.  It is 100% a fake email. you can report the email to ebay security center and delete it. 

Some fake emails will send you links to log in and update your account information. It will say your account will be banned/ selling priveleges suspended if you do not update your account information. It will then give you a link to the information update page. The email will look like it is from ebay, and the link will seem that it leads to an ebay page. But the link actually leads to a page outside ebay. For example, this link appears to lead to the ebay home page http://www.ebay.com but it actually leads to the ebay review page. In many cases you will be misdirected to pages outside of ebay which will attempt to steal your personal information.

Also, NEVER open any attachments in those email. They may have trojan horses and other programs that will attempt to run themselves on your computer and transmit your information.

One thing that will help is using an anti-spyware program. There are some that run while you are browsing the net, and the good ones will even warn you when you when entering fake websites! Also, you can download the ebay toolbar whose account guard feature warns you when you are outside of ebay.

As a basic rule of thumb, when entering information such as used ID and password, you should look at the address bar in your browser make sure you are on the website where you think you are. Remember, phishers will try to make websites as similar as possible to the real one. Always have a peek at the address bar to make sure you are in the real website.