{"id":5401,"date":"2023-12-15T01:59:47","date_gmt":"2023-12-15T06:59:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/brie.hunter.cuny.edu\/hunterathenian\/?p=5401"},"modified":"2023-12-23T18:01:49","modified_gmt":"2023-12-23T23:01:49","slug":"how-not-to-get-scammed-at-hunter","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/brie.hunter.cuny.edu\/hunterathenian\/2023\/12\/how-not-to-get-scammed-at-hunter\/","title":{"rendered":"How Not to Get Scammed at Hunter"},"content":{"rendered":"

Cell phones, computers, and other online devices are essential parts of our daily routine at Hunter College. Many software apps, such as Instagram, LinkedIn, and Adobe Cloud, offer their products and services to consumers. And to use these third-party services, users have to sacrifice their privacy and provide their personal information. This breach of privacy can trigger data leaks to unwanted users, often in the form of scam emails. Hunter College students receive these phishing emails frequently enough for faculty to take action. The mass email sent on September 22, by Eija Ayravainen, Vice President of Student Affairs, offered tips to identify what a potential scam email could look like by giving these examples: \u201c$800 weekly part-time job offer\u201d and \u201cI am giving out my antique piano for free.\u201d Emails like this are often scam emails, where the offer appears too good to be true.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

According to Jonathan Montoya, a sophomore student majoring in history education at Hunter College, \u201cThese scam emails do not include an \u2018unsubscribe\u2019 option from the emailing list. You can’t really stop these emails to be honest, they just keep coming,\u201d said Montoya. \u201cSome of these emails are very funny because of how unrealistic the offer in the email is.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

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Cunyfirst, the online resources and service tool has all the private records of student information. Address, direct deposit information, school emails are included among this information pool. Photo: cuny.edu<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

According to the United States Federal Communications Commission, the CAN-SPAM Act protects individuals from unwanted commercial emails. <\/span>Specifically, Section 14 of the CAN-SPAM Act requires the Commission to develop rules to protect consumers from \u201cunwanted mobile service commercial messages.\u201d All commercial email communications also are required to include a \u201cunsubscribe\u201d or \u201cunsubscribe from the emailing list\u201d hyperlink somewhere in the email. This act protects email recipients from mass unwanted emails.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0Another Hunter College student, Victor Franco, a junior who majors in human biology says, \u201cI get one of these scam-like emails to my school email account at least once a week.\u201d Many of these emails seem realistic enough to provoke follow-up questions. In this instance, Victor tried to contact an email sender who left their phone number in hopes of getting an internship. \u201cI thought it was a real internship opportunity but it won\u2019t let me take too long to realize it\u2019s only a scam once they want me to give them my social security email over text message.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

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A phishing email sent by scammers using the Hunter email system.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

How these scammers have access to Hunter College school emails is still unknown. Another Hunter College student, Helen Moran, a sophomore majoring in pre-med, thinks that cyber-hackers may have tapped into the Hunter College database to gain access to all student emails. \u201cOnline hackers probably hack the school system to get student emails. Since Baruch College got all of its data stolen by hackers, I think it is a possibility,\u201d said Moran.<\/span><\/p>\n

On September 25, Baruch College had a <\/span>ransomware attack<\/span><\/a> that forced the students and faculty to switch to remote learning. The attack forced Baruch College to close its campus to \u201cnon-essential faculty members\u201d for the following day, September 26. Services like internet connection on campus, VPN access, on-campus remote desktops, Microsoft OneDrive, and DropBox were unavailable due to the ransomware attack.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Another way online scammers may have access to student emails is through purchasing data. Many third-party platforms collect our information and go on to sell it. According to the <\/span>Stored Communications Act of the United States Federal Communications Commission, any information an individual provides to a third party is no longer private information and no longer under the protection of the 4th Amendment of the Constitution of the United States. <\/span>Therefore, any third-party service may legally sell its users\u2019 data.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

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The Undergraduate Student Government of Hunter College published a \u201cHow to Not Get Scammed\u201d guide on their instagram account to educate their students on October 2.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

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The Undergraduate Student Government of Hunter College published a guide on its <\/span>Instagram<\/span><\/a> account to increase awareness against scam emails. A few preventative tips included in the guide are:<\/span><\/p>\n