Be vigilant for phishing and scam emails

We regularly receive reports from staff and students of suspicious emails e.g. false vaccination appointments, bogus HMRC tax refunds etc.
These can appear to be very believable and sophisticated and sometimes scammers can take names from university or company websites and then create other email accounts so the sender details look correct.

What to do:
If you think you have received a phishing email to your @hw.ac.uk account
Do not click on any links
Do not open any attachments
Don’t reply to the message

Information Services Help:
To notify Information Services of a phishing email, or you have concerns about whether an email is real or not,  please forward it to phishing@hw.ac.uk  and then delete it.

If you have received a phishing email, accidently clicked the link in it and provided your university credentials (username and password), please send an email to ishelp.hw.ac.uk for assistance.

Accounts that are suspected to be compromised will be blocked automatically for security purposes. 
If your account has been blocked because of this, please send an email to ishelp.hw.ac.uk for assistance.

Information Services are constantly working to make systems including emails as safe and secure as possible.
Planning is underway to implement Multi Factor Authentication for staff and then students to improve staff and student security and their data.

Top tips to help you spot phishing emails

(phishing is the attempt to acquire sensitive information such as usernames, passwords, and credit card details (and sometimes, indirectly, money) by masquerading as a trustworthy entity in an electronic communication).

• Be suspicious of any urgent requests for personal or financial information
• Be aware: Phishing scams are common at main instalment payment dates or connected to newsworthy events
• Check that you’re using a secure website when submitting credit card or other sensitive information.
• Prevention: Your email details may have been taken from a social networking site so avoid disclosing your email address or make sure you hide it on your page
• Look for tell-tale signs of phishing: Check the quality of the communication. Misspelling, poor punctuation and bad grammar are often good indicators