IT Services would like to bring to your immediate attention a rash of recent phishing attempts targeting OLLU students, faculty, and staff.
Fraudsters are sending emails under the guise as OLLU employees. The Sender line (From) will most likely display the name of an OLLU community member; however, the accompanying email address in parentheses identifies the true sender. Be suspicious of emails portraying to be a community member but originate from such email services as gmail, Hotmail, or yahoo. We do not use such email domains to conduct official OLLU business. Below is an example of a legitimate email header:
Legitimate:
From: Garza, Gregory <gjgarza@ollusa.edu>
Sent: Thursday, February 24, 2024 3:25 PM
To: Ramirez, Adolfo <aramirez@ollusa.edu>
Subject: Hello
Suspicious:
From: Greg Garza < leonamike0981@gmail.com >
Sent: Thursday, February 24, 2024 3:25 PM
To: Ramirez, Adolfo <aramirez@ollusa.edu>
Subject: Hello
It has also come to our attention of an instance where a fraudster, impersonating an OLLU employee, successfully victimized a community member by defrauding him/her of an undisclosed amount of money.
The fraudster instructed the unwitting respondent to purchase an arbitrary amount of gift cards and to return images of the backs of each card. Unfortunately, believing the email to come from a legitimate OLLU community member, the respondent complied with the request, resulting in personal financial loss.
While we are taking proactive measures to mitigate the risk, it is imperative that every member of our community remains hyper-vigilant and exercises utmost caution when interacting with emails, links, or attachments, especially those from unfamiliar or suspicious sources.
Please be aware that email originating from an external email address will have a caution banner. Should you receive a suspicious email please click the PhishNotify or the Report button located on your Outlook ribbon.