Imagine you receive an urgent email from your bank asking you to confirm your details to avoid your account being blocked. It looks totally legitimate, it has the logo, the corporate colours, and there is nothing strange about it. Without thinking, you click on the link and log in, and within minutes, your information is in the hands of cybercriminals.
This type of cyberattack is called phishing, a type of fraud that continues to affect thousands of people around the world. With the rise of e-commerce and remote work, they have increased significantly, becoming more and more sophisticated. It is therefore necessary to learn how to identify them so that we know how to protect ourselves.
Detecting phishing is not easy, as many messages appear legitimate: emails demanding urgent replies, grammatical errors, or impersonal greetings can be tell-tale clues. In addition, always verifying the sender and avoiding clicking on suspicious links are key aspects of staying safe.
To complement this, innovative cybersecurity tools such as Latch offer an additional layer of security. Below we will explain how Latch works and how to detect phishing on your computer.
What are the dangers of phishing?
Phishing is one of the most dangerous cyberthreats today because it focuses directly on stealing our personal and financial information, such as passwords, credit card numbers, and bank details. Cybercriminals use this data to commit fraud, access accounts, and carry out unauthorised transactions. Once attackers gain access, they can impersonate the victim and affect not only their transfers, but also their reputation.
At the business level, phishing can have devastating consequences. An employee who falls for this type of scam can open the door to attackers who could gain access to corporate services, confidential information, and even damage the company’s organisation or digital structure. This can result in financial losses, service disruptions, and even legal problems.
How to detect phishing?
One of the first steps in detecting a phishing attempt is to carefully check the sender of the email or message. Fraudsters often mimic addresses of legitimate companies, but often include small errors or variations in the domain. It is also important to look at the tone and urgency of the message: emails that pressure you to click on a link or provide personal information are often suspicious. If in doubt, it is best to contact the company directly using their official channels and verify that the request for information is legitimate.
Another useful tip for detecting phishing is to look at links before you click: by hovering over the link (without clicking), you can see the full URL and determine if it leads to a trustworthy site. Additionally, although everything seems to be in order at first glance, these messages often include grammatical and formatting errors. This is because many of these messages are translated or generated quickly.
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For added protection, it is advisable to use security tools such as two-factor authentication and authorisation controls that help block access to accounts in case the user has fallen victim to a phishing attack.
How to avoid phishing with TU Latch?
TU, the brand for innovation and technology products and services from Telefónica Innovación Digital, has developed Latch. It is an authorisation control platform that adds an extra layer of security to digital services to protect your users from certain internet threats, including phishing. It is a service that allows you to create an authorisation control architecture, which enables or restricts access to your accounts and profiles, and protects certain critical operations. In the event that the user’s credentials have been compromised, they will receive a notification alerting them that someone is attempting to gain access without their consent.
On the other hand, another feature is the Secure browsing copilot, which allows you to surf the Internet safely by validating the authenticity of the websites you visit, detecting potential threats or suspicious activities. If a malicious domain or phishing attempt is identified, Latch not only detects it quickly and alerts you, but also blocks access to protect you before any damage can occur.
So even if you do click on a suspicious link, Secure browsing copilot acts as a firewall, a second line of defence, protecting your data and preventing you from falling into phishing traps. You can protect yourself from phishing and other cyberthreats by downloading the app and hiring the service in a simple way.
Graduada en el Doble Grado de Ingeniería en Diseño Industrial y Desarrollo de Producto + Ingeniería Mecánica. Soy una persona muy organizada, pero con una mente muy creativa. Trabajo en el equipo de Product Marketing CDO en Telefónica Innovación Digital aprendiendo todo lo que puedo.
