Useful tips on how to protect yourself from Phishing:
- Be wary of emails that ask you to enter confidential data (your username and password, dispositive transactions, payment card codes, other personal information). Creditis Servizi Finanziari S.p.A. never asks through e-mail messages to provide this data.
- In the event that an email contains “suspicious” requests, do not reply to the email itself but inform Creditis Servizi Finanziari S.p.A. immediately by sending an email to: info@creditis.it
- Carefully check e-mails from Creditis Servizi Finanziari S.p.A. that you receive at an e-mail address other than the one used for the Valea card application.
- Do not click on links in “suspicious” e-mails, but access the site by typing the name of the site directly from the address bar.
- Pay attention to suspicious elements in received emails. This way you can detect most fraudulent e-mails.
Fraudulent e-mails usually have the following characteristics:- they are not personalized and contain a generic message requesting personal information, for reasons that are not always well specified (e.g.: expiration, loss, technical problems, etc.)
- they make use of “intimidating” tones (e.g.: threatening to suspend the account if the user does not respond)
- also in presence of a personalization, the e-mail does not nearly never make reference to the name and last name of the recipient but to an address of electronic mail (es.: bianchi.m@poste.it)
- do not include an expiration date for sending information
- they contain spelling errors and are often written in an incorrect form.
- ask you not to reply to the sender but to click on the address provided
- When entering confidential data in a web page, make sure that it is a protected page Protected pages are recognizable because the address that appears in the address bar of the browser begins with “https://” and not with “http://”. Also, protected pages contain a padlock in the lower right-hand corner of the browser. By double-clicking on the padlock it is possible to verify the existence of a “certificate” that guarantees the authenticity of the site. It is important to check to whom (and by whom) the certificate has been issued.
- Please check your statements regularly to ensure that the transactions reported are those actually made. If this is not the case, contact Creditis Servizi Finanziari SpA by sending an email to: info@creditis.it
- Be wary of sudden changes in the way in which you are asked to enter your access codes: for example, if you are asked not via a page on the site, but via a pop-up (an additional window of reduced size). In this case, please contact Creditis Servizi Finanziari S.p.A. immediately by sending an e-mail to: info@creditis.it
- Constantly update your security software and, if necessary, your Internet browsing programs. The browser companies periodically make available online (and free to download) updates (so-called patches) which increase the security of these programs. On the sites of these companies you can also check that your browser is up-to-date; if not, it is advisable to download and install the patches.
Remember also that:
- Creditis Servizi Finanziari S.p.A.’s online services are made in compliance with high security standards.
- Access is via the HTTPs protocol (HTTP with SSL) which, by encrypting the information exchanged, protects it from interception and violation.
- Like phishing, pharming consists in collecting log-in data and other user identification data. Unlike phishing, however, this scam does not involve sending a misleading email to the user (see the section on phishing for more information).
- Pharming consists in exploiting a technical procedure that makes the address of the requested site correspond to a different server from the real one.
- Once arrived in this site that often is a copy apparently identical to the original, the user will be invited to enter his data that will be collected and used in a fraudulent way. The browser, entering the site, must show, in the lower right or left, depending on the type and version of browser used, an icon in the shape of a closed padlock indicative of a “protected” connection. If this padlock is not present, close the page and nothing will happen. It is also important to verify that the content of the certificate of protection of the site (accessible just by clicking on the padlock), is corresponding to that really issued by the certification body that guarantees the security of transactions, in our case Thawte.