A college that we communicate with regularly has had one of their email accounts compromised. As a result, several people around campus have received emails with requests to Download Attachments from Sharefile.  The emails look like this:

The name of the college and the email sender have been blurred out to protect their privacy.

 

What makes these emails so devious is that they come from someone that Mount Royal staff have been conversing with recently. This makes it much more challenging to identify them as malicious.

This is a gentle reminder to everyone to contact the email sender when you receive an unexpected email with a link or attachment using a contact number that you have used in the past or have found through Google.  Even if you have been speaking with them recently if you aren’t expecting the email, call to confirm its legitimacy. Just because an email looks like it comes from someone you know, doesn’t mean it does.

That is what our brave Mount Royal employee did and as a result prevented a potentially serious cyber security incident. Had they simply clicked on the Download Attachments button and followed the instructions, they would have given the hacker their Docusign credentials. Who knows what that would have led to.