Paypal Scam

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Paypal Scam

The message warns however that the account can only be recovered "within a short period of time after deletion".

This message is not from PayPal and the claim that your account have been deleted is also untrue. The email is a phishing scam designed to trick PayPal users into divulging their login information to cybercriminals.

The scammers hope that at least some people will be momentarily panicked into believing that their account has been deleted, and will click the "recover Account" link without checking first. The scammers also add urgency by suggesting that you must act quickly if you wish to recover your account, as this further increase the likelihood that you will quickly click the link.

If you click the link you will be taken to a fake PayPal login page and asked to submit your account email address and password. You may then be automatically redirected to the genuine PayPal website. Meanwhile, the criminals operating the scam can collect your stolen account details and use them to take control of your PayPal account.

This type of scam is called Phishing and PayPal is regularly targeted. It is important to remember that PayPal will always include your real name in any notifications that it sends. Emails claiming to be from PayPal that use generic greetings such as "Dear customer" or do not include a greeting at all, should be treated as suspect.

If you receive a suspect email, do not click on any links or open any attachments that it contains. It is always safest to login to your online accounts by entering the account address into your browser address bar rather than by clicking a link in an email.

If you believe you have been a victim of this type of scam you should promptly report it to the IC3's website at www.IC3.gov. The IC3's complaint database links complaints together to refer them to the appropriate law enforcement agency for case consideration.

Remember - always watch for scams!

Steve