Look at the Email Address

Legitimate companies send emails through a server based out of their company website (for example, support@microsoft.com). If you see a long string of numbers in front of the @ sign or the name of a free email service before the .com (or any other domain), you need to question the legitimacy of the email in question. Also, check for any typos or errors in the domain name. Sometimes they will use one that looks very similar like Support@Mircosoft.com to try and trick you into thinking it’s legitimate when it’s not.

Look at the Content

Keep an eye out for emails that say you need to do something right at that second or within a certain number of hours. Also, be wary of any emails that include links. Most companies tell you what to do, but they never direct you to where to do it with a link. Finally, rampant grammatical and spelling errors within the body of an email are good signs that it’s spam. Spammers don’t care enough about the actual messages they’re sending to take the time to make them make sense.

If It Asks for Personal Information

Most institutions you deal with come right out and say they’re never going to ask for personal information in an email. They don’t need to ask you for your personal information anyway because they usually have it on hand. So, if you get an email that asks you for any personal information, no matter how legitimate it might seem, delete it right away. Personal information is only meant to be entered in secure, encrypted forms, not emails where anyone and everyone can get their hands on your information.

Look at the Greeting

When you receive a genuine email, the sender addresses you directly, using either your first or last name. If you receive an email where they refer to you as a “Valued Customer” or as a member of some company, its spam. Senders of your genuine emails want to get your attention, so they always address you directly.

Unexpected Attachments

Often malicious spam emails will use attachments disguised as innocuous things such as invoices or forms. However, if you aren’t expecting that from the sender, then you should be suspicious and delete it or independently verify that you were supposed to get it.

If It Ends Up In Your Spam Folder

You might be reading this entry and thinking “Duh!” But you would be surprised how many people go rummaging through their spam folder like there’s something they need in there. Unless you accidentally categorized legitimate emails as spam, you can be pretty sure that all the emails you need will appear in your inbox. Sometimes emails from certain websites end up in the spam folder. You must deal with those on a case-by-case basis to determine whether or not they’re legitimate of pushing garbage into your inbox.