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Don’t get hooked in by phishing campaigns

If you are one of the millions of Brits with an iPhone in their pocket right now, here’s a little warning just for you.

The world’s most ubiquitous mobile device may be great for calls, messaging, FaceTime, games and just about everything else but, like so many things in today’s society, it is susceptible to being used by criminals.

This isn’t the kind of pick-pocket thief, who have existed since the dawn of time, but the modern day criminal dealing in, what is widely known as, ‘cybercrime’ – the faceless thieves of the internet age who can steal thousands from your bank account without even leaving their home.

The latest scam to hit members of the iPhone family is the fake ‘Apple’ message, sent out in phishing campaigns.

In the message, it warns the owner of the handset that their account has been frozen or their iTunes cannot be verified, providing a link to follow to rectify the problem.

It tends to come just moments after a separate message, again supposedly from Apple, warning that the user’s iCloud Account is about to expire.

According to researchers at FireEye, these campaigns are used to access Apple ID and passwords which can lead to illegal purchases via the Apple Store for their own personal gain.

For users who receive such a message, the advice is simple – just ignore it.

If you do follow the link, don’t worry, you still have to enter details for them to be stolen. Just close the page and delete the message. Simple as that.

Some 86 phishing domains have been logged since January 2016, showing an increase in the number of scammers. Just beware that you don’t get caught out.