According to this supposedly urgent email, which purports to be from AOL, you need to accept a new Terms of Service agreement by a specified date or you will no longer be able to access your account.
The email claims that AOL needs “a few moments of your time to explain how we manage your data and provide you with some choices in relation to the processing of that data’.
According to this supposedly urgent email, which purports to be from AOL, you need to accept a new Terms of Service agreement by a specified date or you will no longer be able to access your account.
The email claims that AOL needs “a few moments of your time to explain how we manage your data and provide you with some choices in relation to the processing of that data’.
It urges you to click a link to get started.
However, the email was not sent by AOL. Instead, it is a phishing scam designed to steal your personal information.
To make their claims seem legitimate, the scammers have used snippets of text copied from genuine account notification messages that may have been sent out to customers in the past.
Clicking any of the links in the email opens a fraudulent website that looks like it belongs to AOL. Once on the fake site, you will be asked to enter your email address and account password. You will then see a message claiming that you have successfully completed the process.
Criminals can now collect the information that you supplied and use it to hijack your account. Once they have gained access, they can use the account to distribute spam, scam, and malware emails in your name. They can also steal personal information from within the account.
Details, such as the supposed account termination date, may vary in different versions of the scam email.
AOL customers have been repeatedly targetted via a series of similar scam emails.
If you receive one, do not follow any links or open any attachments that it contains. It is always safest to login to your online accounts by entering the address into your browsers address bar or via a trusted app.
An example of the scam email:
Transcript:
Subject: Urgent Information
Dear user
We emailed you last month to let you know about changes we are making to our Terms of Service and Privacy Policy. These changes are key steps towards creating what’s next for our consumers, like you, while empowering them with transparency and controls over how and when their data is used.
You can learn more about what these policies mean for you here, as well as more about the changes in our FAQs.
In order to continue to access your Aol Mail account after November 9TH 2019, you will need to confirm you accept the Terms of Service. We also need a few moments of your time to explain how we manage your data and provide you with some choices in relation to the processing of that data.
Click here to start.
If you do not want the new Terms of Service and Privacy Policy to apply to you, you will no longer be able to access your account from November 9th 2019. If you would like the contents of your email account, you may obtain a copy of your data by clicking here.
Thank you for your time and cooperation.
Aol Mail Customer Service
Importance Notice
After considerable thought and with an ache in my heart, I have decided that the time has come to close down the Hoax-Slayer website.These days, the site does not generate enough revenue to cover expenses, and I do not have the financial resources to sustain it going forward.
Moreover, I now work long hours in a full-time and physically taxing job, so maintaining and managing the website and publishing new material has become difficult for me.
And finally, after 18 years of writing about scams and hoaxes, I feel that it is time for me to take my fingers off the keyboard and focus on other projects and pastimes.
When I first started Hoax-Slayer, I never dreamed that I would still be working on the project all these years later or that it would become such an important part of my life. It's been a fantastic and engaging experience and one that I will always treasure.
I hope that my work over the years has helped to make the Internet a little safer and thwarted the activities of at least a few scammers and malicious pranksters.
A Big Thank You
I would also like to thank all of those wonderful people who have supported the project by sharing information from the site, contributing examples of scams and hoaxes, offering suggestions, donating funds, or helping behind the scenes.I would especially like to thank David White for his tireless contribution to the Hoax-Slayer Facebook Page over many years. David's support has been invaluable, and I can not thank him enough.
Closing Date
Hoax-Slayer will still be around for a few weeks while I wind things down. The site will go offline on May 31, 2021. While I will not be publishing any new posts, you can still access existing material on the site until the date of closure.Thank you, one and all!
Brett Christensen,
Hoax-Slayer
