Excersising Caution With Unsolicited E-Mail

As with all dangers, there are ways that you can protect yourself from falling for scams. Clues lie within the e-mail message itself.
The most important thing to remember is to always take a good look at any page or e-mail that asks you to send personal information, or money. Use your logic. If there was no announcement on the e-mail service provider page, and the message isn’t coming from a logical e-mail address for someone who is head of a financial department, then a message asking you to send $12.95 for your previously free e-mail address probably isn’t real.
You should always take a good look at the address that the message is coming from. A message coming from staff@emailprovider.com is going to be more credible than one coming from a2f4jf778@iheartemail.com. If an address doesn’t look professional, chances are that the message isn’t either.
Simple errors like typos are an important hint as well. A real, professional message will not have typos like “hte” or “emial”. Any typo tells you that the message wasn’t professionally produced.
Take a look at how the message is addressed. If they refer to you as “Valued Customer”, “Recipient”, or, without any title at all, the message was mass-produced without access to the information you set up with your e-mail provider.
All of these provide clues as to the true origins of an e-mail message. It really is very simple. If a message doesn’t look professional, it isn’t, but more importantly, is what I consider to be the golden rule of unsolicited e-mail messages: Always exercise caution and vigilance.