2018-10-10: Fraudulent message where the sender assures us it is legitimate!

Just a heads up about a fraudulent message that’s been reported.  A screenshot (with the recipient redacted) is below.  The red box was added by me to highlight the “This Message is from a Newpaltz trusted source”.  This is similar to a criminal putting a sign up saying “Trust me – I’m legit!”.  It is text added by the scammers to make their message look authentic.  I’m emailing about it because we haven’t seen this tactic before.

Beyond that – the message is a pretty standard phishing scam.  An attempt to trick you into clicking a link to access ‘pending messages’ (which is not something New Paltz does or ever will do), which will then ask for your username & password on a seemingly legitimate site.

 

They have Newpaltz in their From name – but that doesn’t mean anything.

 

As always – please keep being cautious – and thanks for forwarding these kinds of scams over when you receive them.


Screenshot of fraudulent message.  The message says that there are "pending messages" that are awaiting delivery.