Regina, SK – Phishing refers to an email that attempts to fraudulently acquire personal information from you, such as your password and/or credit card information. On the surface, the email may appear to be from a legitimate company or individual, but it's not.
As a general rule, never send credit card information, account passwords, or extensive personal information in an email unless you verify that the recipient is who they claim to be. Most companies have policies that state they will never solicit such information from customers by email.
Legitimate Access Communications customer service agents will have your account information on-hand and will always confirm it with you for identification purposes. An Access Communications agent will never ask for bank account or credit card information to confirm your identity, and this information should not be volunteered until the identity of the caller has been confirmed.
How to Identify Phishing Attempts
- Often, there are spelling or grammatical errors. Most reputable companies proofread their customer emails before sending them out.
- The email is from an address that does not belong to the company in question. Usually a company has a personalized email address, such as @companyname.com. *Emails from Access end with @myaccess.coop.
- The email asks for personal information, such as a password or account number. Unless there was a previous communication, a reputable company will not ask for this information via email.
- There will usually be a sense of urgency – the email may suggest that you will lose your account or have information deleted if you don’t respond. Sometimes, it will include links to websites, which should not be clicked.
What to Do If You Receive Suspected Phishing Attempts
If you receive what you believe to be a phishing email purporting to be from Access, please send it to help@myaccess.coop, a monitored email inbox, which does not generate individual email replies.
Forwarding the message with complete header information provides Access Communications with important information. To do this, select the message and choose Forward As Attachment from the Message menu. For other email applications or webmail based services, consult your provider’s support information to determine how to forward messages with complete headers.
If you feel that your bank account, credit card or any other financial information has been compromised, you should take steps to secure your information by contacting your financial institution immediately.
If you are unsure of the validity of the email received in regards to your Access Communications, contact us directly at 1-866-363-2225 to report the situation. A customer service representative will be able to confirm whether or not you have been contacted by Access.