Avoid Phishing Scams and Online Identity Theft This Holiday Season

Email Senders Not Always Who They Claim to Be

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif., Dec. 5, 2006 -- Commercial email senders such as retailers and financial institutions will significantly increase their email communications this month. While shopping and conducting personal business online saves time and hassle during the busy holiday season, it's more critical than ever to be aware of emails scams, online fraud and phishing attempts and be able to identify legitimate email.

Preying on the significant online shopping traffic and the general preoccupation of consumers between Thanksgiving and New Year's, email fraudsters are out in full force this time of year. But because email is increasingly valued for delivery of receipts, airline tickets, travel itineraries and shipping confirmations, it's important that users know what emails they can trust.

• If you receive an email from your bank and want to check on account status or respond to the email, go to your bank's website manually; do not reply to the email directly or click on the link contained in the message.
• Do not confirm personal information via email. Accredited banks will not contact customers via email to request account details or social security numbers. Ignore and delete these suspicious messages.
• Many airlines, retailers and financial institutions are choosing to certify their email communications so that each message includes a trust icon. Look for this classification in your AOL or Yahoo! inbox to indicate the legitimate emails from the potentially fraudulent.
• Do not respond to commercial email messages that you are unfamiliar with. If, for example, you receive a discount offer via email for Store XYX that you want to take advantage of, visit the retailer's web site directly. Do not interact with the email offering unless you are positive it's legitimate and safe.

"The holiday season brings a barrage of commercial email, some of it downright dangerous," said Richard Gingras, CEO and co-founder of Goodmail Systems, creator of CertifiedEmail - a class of email designed to help shield consumers from email fraud and phishing scams. "Last year I received an email from a retailer I trust offering special discounts. After careful inspection of the message, I found a very slick phishing scam with a link to a polished, quality website that looked like the real thing - but wasn't. Many consumers likely fell victim to this scam because most do not know what to look for to gauge security and legitimacy. Unfortunately, email users should default to skepticism unless they have valid reasons to believe messages are safe - not the other way around."

About Goodmail Systems

Goodmail Systems makes CertifiedEmail™, the industry standard class of trusted email. CertifiedEmail provides a safe and reliable means for consumers to easily identify authentic email messages from legitimate commercial and nonprofit email senders. Each CertifiedEmail is sent with a cryptographically secure token that assures authenticity, and is marked in the inbox with a unique blue ribbon envelope icon, enabling consumers to visually distinguish email messages which are real and sent from email senders with whom they have a pre-existing relationship. Available to email senders meeting strict standards for best practices and low complaint rates, it is the only class of email available that assures delivery of all opt-in email messages to the inbox, with links and images automatically rendered intact, yielding measurable improvements in email campaign effectiveness. CertifiedEmail has been adopted by seven of the nation's top ten email mailbox providers, and is in use by 500 commercial, government and non-profit senders. It is supported in North America and Europe by a wide network of email platforms and service providers.

Media Contacts

Stephen Gilmore
Manning Selvage & Lee
Telephone: 212-468-4056
Email: stephen.gilmore@mslpr.com