As new research from Which?, the U.K. consumer champion association, shows one particular type of brand impersonation scam spiking as the 2024 holiday season fast approaches, Gmail could be your unlikely virtual knight in shining armor. Here’s what you need to know about parcel delivery scam protection.
The Most Impersonated Brands And The Seasonal Delivery Scams That Gmail Users Need To Be Aware Of
According to a Dec. 04 Which? report, research carried out with the DNS Research Federation has revealed that well known courier services and online retailers top the list of brands most impersonated in the execution of delivery notification parcel scams. The likes of the United States Postal Service, Amazon, DHL, InPost and Royal Mail all featured, unsurprisingly, in the list. After all, it’s always going to be the services that most people use, especially at this time of year, that will be targeted by scammers looking to trick victims into clicking links that lead to credential theft and fraud. All of these services already provide advice for customers to help them avoid phishing attacks all year around, and I heartily recommend that you search their customer support sites for this. The common thread is, Which? said, “The messages usually claim you’ve missed a delivery, or there’s a chance you could miss a delivery – aiming to pressure you into clicking a link included in the text.”
How Can Gmail Help Prevent Falling Victim To Parcel Notification Scams?
Gmail users have access to a feature called smart summary cards. I’ll admit I was somewhat wary of from the security perspective when they were first launched with a “happening soon” function in October, 2024, worrying that these might be abused by precisely the kind of scammers I am talking about in this article. I am pleased to say that I’ve not seen any evidence that this has been the case. In fact, I’ve somewhat changed my opinion on this one and would now suggest that summary cards are part of the solution rather than problem when it comes to delivery tracking impersonation scams.
But here’s what excites me most, about security measure that adds this ease of use without, as I’m now happy to state, diluting the risk to the user significantly. In fact, not diluting it at all. “Summary cards are secured with the same robust defenses that safeguard all of Gmail,” a Google spokesperson said, “with AI-powered defenses, we stop 99.9% of phishing, malware and spam from ever reaching inboxes.” Of course, it’s not perfect, there’s no such thing as a 100% security guarantee. However, combined with other existing phishing protections that are built into the Gmail platform, and a healthy dose of stay-safe awareness, it’s about as good as it gets right now for Google’s billions of email users.
That said, I’d also recommend everyone, Gmail user or not, to read this highly thought-provoking advice on how existing security perceptions need to change if the phishing threat is to ever to stand a chance of being totally eradicated.
