Telstra customers should be wary of any emails claiming that their payment has been unsuccessful – it could be the latest phishing scam which tries to steal your credit card details. If you’re not already a MailGuard user, it’s highly likely this email will end up in the inbox of someone from your business.
The email subject line warns the user that “Your AutoPay payment Was unsuccessful !”, and while the sender name shows ‘Telstra.com.au’, the email is actually fraudulent, coming from ‘Telstra.com.au@ovh.us’.
Although the email itself looks similar to one you could expect to receive from Telstra, once you begin reading the text, there’s an immediate giveaway that this is a scam. All of the emails that MailGuard have blocked begin with “Dear [-emailuser-]”. Telstra, as with most businesses, always personalise emails by using the customer’s first name.
The email continues to explain that the payment for your last owing bill was unsuccessful, and that in order to fix this, you need to update your credit card details by clicking the button that says, “Open My Telstra >”. While the majority of the text is legible, you will notice a number of grammatical errors which also alert you to the fact this is a scam email.
Here’s what the email looks like:
Upon clicking the button, the user is taken to a phishing page. Although the page itself looks similar to Telstra’s website, the URL shows that you’re actually visiting the website of a compromised foreign bio-medical company.
On this page, the user is asked to enter their credit card details, including name, card number, expiry, and CCV, and then directed to click the button to ‘Confirm’.
Once the credit card details have been entered, the user is taken to a One Time Password (OTP) page, which asks for a code that is supposedly sent to the user’s mobile. This is a common tactic used by cybercriminals to feign authenticity, although by this point, the credit card details have already been harvested.
Cybercriminals frequently impersonate brands like Telstra, due to their trusted name, large customer base and the crucial nature of the services that they provide. If you have received a suspicious email which purports to be from Telstra, we recommend you read their advice about how to report the scam to Telstra on this page: https://www.telstra.com.au/consumer-advice/scam-email
MailGuard strongly recommends all recipients of this email to delete it immediately without clicking on any links. Providing your personal details can result in your sensitive information being used for criminal activity and may have a severe negative impact on your business and its’ financial well-being.
Many businesses turn to MailGuard after an incident or a near miss, often as a result of an email similar to the one shown above. If unwanted emails are a problem for your business, don’t wait until it’s too late.
Reach out to our team for a confidential discussion by emailing expert@mailguard.com.au or calling 1300 30 44 30.
MailGuard urges users not to click links or open attachments within emails that:
- Are not addressed to you by name.
- Appear to be from a legitimate company but use poor English or omits personal details that a legitimate sender would include.
- Are from businesses that you were not expecting to hear from, and/or
- Take you to a landing page or website that is not the legitimate URL of the company the email is purporting to be sent from.
One email is all that it takes
All that it takes to devastate your business is a cleverly worded email message that can steal sensitive user credentials or disrupt your business operations. If scammers can trick one person in your company into clicking on a malicious link or attachment, they can gain access to your data or inflict damage on your business.
For a few dollars per staff member per month, you can protect your business with MailGuard's predictive and advanced email security. Talk to a solution consultant at MailGuard today about securing your company's inboxes.
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