PayPal ‘We’re Still Waiting For You to Resolve The Recent Case’ Scam Email

Outline:
Email claiming to be from PayPal warns that the company is still waiting for you to  ‘resolve the recent case’ and has therefore limited your account until some of your details can be checked.

Brief Analysis:
The email is not from PayPal. It is just one more in an almost continuous barrage of phishing scams that are designed to steal your PayPal account login credentials, your credit card numbers, and other sensitive personal information via fake ‘update’ forms on a fraudulent website.

Detailed Analysis:
According to this email, which purports to be from PayPal, the company is ‘still waiting for you to resolve the recent case’. This implies that the email is a follow up to a previous message that you perhaps failed to respond to. The email warns that your account has therefore been limited and you will need to click a ‘confirm account’ link to deal with the supposed issue  and lift the limitation.

To make it seem more authentic, the email features  the PayPal logo and – rather ironically – even includes some security tips in the footer.

But, the  email is certainly not from PayPal and the claim that you must confirm your account details to lift an account limitation is a lie. It is, in fact, yet another phishing scam attempt in an almost continuous barrage of such PayPal related scam messages.

If you fall for the ruse and click  the link, you will be taken to a website that very closely mirrors the genuine PayPal home page. Unless you look at the web address, which is in no way related to the real PayPal URL , you may not see any immediate signs that indicate that the site is faked. So, you may go ahead and click the login button as you would normally do when visiting PayPal. This will invoke a seemingly genuine login box.

After you supply your login credentials on the fake site, the following  ‘Account Limited’ notice will appear:

If you then click the ‘continue’ button, you will be taken through a sequence of fake forms that ask you to supply your address details, your driver’s licence number, your credit card numbers, and your banking information:

After completing all of the update forms, you may receive a final message stating that you have successfully confirmed your account and lifted the supposed limitation.

Meanwhile, however, the scammers can use the information you supplied via the fake forms to hijack your PayPal account and your bank account,  use the hijacked accounts and your credit card to conduct fraudulent transactions, and attempt to steal your identity.

PayPal undertakes  almost all of its business via email and the  Internet. Thus, its customers are a favourite target for phishing scammers. Always login to your PayPal account by entering the address into your browser’s address bar or via a trusted PayPal app rather than by clicking an email link. Note  that PayPal will never  send you an email that demands that you click a link to update your details or fix a supposed account problem. And, genuine PayPal  emails will always  address you by name. They will never  use generic greetings such as ‘Dear Customer’. Nor will they omit the greeting as the above scam example does.

The PayPal website includes information about how to recognise and report phishing scams.

Last updated: March 20, 2016
First published: March 20, 2016
By Brett M. Christensen
About Hoax-Slayer

References
Scam Email Threatens PayPal Account Closure Within 72 Hours
PayPal ‘Account Notification’ Phishing Scam
Phishing Scams – Anti-Phishing Information
Report a suspicious email or website

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