identify

Rick Wash, Michigan State University An employee at MacEwan University got an email in 2017 from someone claiming to be a construction contractor asking to change the account number where almost $12 million in payments were sent. A week later the actual contractor called asking when the payment would arrive. The email about the account number change was fake. Instead of going to the contractor, the payments were sent to accounts controlled by criminals. Fake emails that try to get people to do things they wouldn’t normally do, such as send money, run dangerous programs or give out passwords, are known as phishing emails. Cybersecurity experts often blame the people who receive such messages for not noticing that the emails are fake. As a cybersecurity researcher, I’ve found that most pe...

In times of mortal strife, humans crave information more than ever, and it’s journalists’ responsibility to deliver it. But what if that information is inaccurate, or could even kill people? That’s the quandary journalists have found themselves in as they decide whether to cover President Donald J. Trump’s press briefings live. Some television networks have started cutting away from the briefings, saying the events are no more than campaign rallies, and that the president is spreading falsehoods that endanger the public. “If Trump is going to keep lying like he has been every day on stuff this important, we should, all of us, stop broadcasting it,” MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow tweeted. “Honestly, it’s going to cost lives.” News decisions and ethical dilemmas aren’t simple, but withholding in...

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A Cybersecurity Researcher Explains How To Trust Your Instincts – Identify Phishing Emails And Foil The Attacks

It’s a bad idea for journalists to censor Trump – instead, they can help the public identify what’s true or false