Southtrust bank scam

[EricNoah]

I just got an e-mail from "southtrust bank" instructing me to follow a link and verify my account with a username and password.

The odd thing is that I *did* just have an unusual experience with a money market account of mine via online access and wasn't sure if Southbank was maybe a parent company of the group that runs my account.

A brief search online did not reveal a widespread hoax of this nature. The company is a real company. However, I'm extremely suspicious. The URL started with numbers: 219.163.49.210 and at the root there is no web page, just a server setup page.

I thought I'd pass this along as a warning/caution until I can find out what is going on.

 

[Cthulhu's Librarian]

Sure sounds like a scam to me. All the banks I deal with have told me numerous times that they will NEVER send me an email asking me to verify my account. I'd call your money market manager and ask them if they are related to southtrust bank in any way, and if this was related to your account problems. I'll bet that they say no.

 

[EricNoah]

A little more digging...

http://www.fraudwatchinternational.com/fraudalerts2/0412/pages/041216_4475_southtrust.htm

Yeah, it's a scam.

 

[Turanil]

I just got an e-mail from "southtrust bank" instructing me to follow a link and verify my account with a username and password.

Do not answer PLEASE! I got the same type of email from ebay, but when asking ebay they told me it was fraudulous emails sent by some thieves to get code and credit cards numbers!

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EDIT: Ah yeah, I didn't had read all the posts...

 

[Henry]

I get a "please verify" message at LEAST once a week. I and my company's e-mail addresses are on somebody's scam list for sure. I've warned my staff repeatedly, so they know to sack any messages of that nature.

At least that's an easy one to catch. *rolleyes* These little get craftier every month.

 

[Bagpuss]

I just got an e-mail from "xxxxxxx" instructing me to follow a link and verify my account with a username and password.

Any email that asks you to do that is a scam.

 

[cybertalus]

FWIW, this site will let you put in an IP address and tell you who it's currently controlled by.

In this case it's part of a block controlled by a group headquartered in Australia that doles out IP addresses in the Asia/Pacific area. Looks like that specific IP is part of a large block leased by an ISP in Japan, who in turn lease it (along with half a dozen others) to a group called Sowa Research Co.,Ltd.

So even if you hadn't found it on a scam list, it's probably safe to say your bank isn't owned by a research firm in Japan. Though that IP may very well be used because a trojan is installed on a machine at the research firm to collect whatever information is stolen.

 

[Terath Ninir]

All such emails are always scams, period.

I have gotten a number of ones claiming to be from PayPal. Always to one of my email accounts that is not connected to PayPal. Never the one that is.

 

[Nightcloak]

As a rule of thumb. Any company that holds private information of yours will not have you log in via email or a link. They will always have you log on via their website then notify you of problems with your account. By going through the website you are protected.

I've actually watched people follow ebay links in emails to sites that were designed to look just like ebay for the express purpose of getting secure information (They were stopped from "logging in" and instead sent the link to ebay - within the day they were notified that the site was a hoax). Scary.

Moral of the story. Only log onto a site by going there directly.

 

[IronWolf]

Yeah, never ever follow a link in email that is asking for you to verify your account information. These "phishing" scams are floatin *all* over the Internet these days, anyone from ebay, paypal, suntrust, us bank, you name it. As someone else has already said never click the link in an email that you expect to take to your financial site or otherwise. Just go straight there in your browser to be you you are on the correct site.