October is Cyber Security Awareness Month, and with a rising number of high-profile cyber incidents, it is more important than ever that we all do what we can to keep our own data safe to protect ourselves and those who we deal with electronically.
As a client of Thomson & Bancks, ‘You matter to us’ and so does your cyber security! This is what you can expect when dealing with us.
We will ensure that we know you. We undertake checks before taking on any piece of work to ensure that you are who you say you are, including an electronic identification and verification process.
You will provide us with best contact details. At the beginning of your matter with us, you will be asked to supply us with contact details that we would not expect to change throughout the course of our matter with you.
We will provide our bank details at the start of the work. We will send you a copy of our bank details at the beginning of your transaction with us. Our standard policy is not to email these to you, and we will not change our bank details during the course of your matter with us.
You will provide your bank details at the start of the work. We will not accept these details by email. We will also run checks on this account to ensure it is an account that belongs to you.
When we send you money, we will check your bank details. We will have asked you for your bank details at the beginning of your dealings with us and will always contact you via phone or in person to check these details before we send any funds to you. We will not accept late instructions to change the bank account we use to send money to you.
You will check our bank account details. Before you send us any funds, please contact us using a trusted telephone number to check the bank account details with the person dealing with your matter. If you receive any requests to change bank details by email part way through your matter, contact us immediately.
We will only send emails to you through our company domain. All emails from us will come from the domain @tbsolicitors.co.uk – any misspelling or misconfiguration of our email address will tell you that the email is false and has not come from us.
You will check emails from us. Before you act on anything in an email from us, ensure the email address and footer formatting matches that of the one you know to be correct. When you click ‘reply’, check the reply email address matches the email address of the person at Thomson & Bancks you are dealing with. If you receive a fake email claiming to be from us, report it to us on a trusted telephone number immediately.
You will change your password. If you receive any suspicious emails claiming to be from us or any of your other email contacts, you must change your password immediately and let us know, as your email account could have been compromised.
We will support you. If you are ever in doubt over the legitimacy of something in your dealings with us, please contact us on a known telephone number immediately and speak to a member of the Thomson & Bancks team that you have spoken to before. We will always be happy to check things with you to give you peace of mind and stop fraudsters gaining possession of your information and/or money.
We will never be too busy to take your call. Fraudsters will try to put you off telephoning the office, but we will never be too busy to speak with you. If our lines are engaged, leave us a message or call again later but never act on anything without speaking to us first. If in doubt, don’t do it!
Top tips to stay safe online
- Ensure your devices are protected by an effective anti-virus and run regular scans on all your devices. This includes your mobile phone.
- Keep the operating software on your devices up to date. Yes, the restarts can come at inconvenient times – for example during a key scene in the series you have been binge watching on your laptop too late into the night – but staying updated keeps your devices more secure as the software and operating system updates often contain security vulnerability fixes.
- Create strong, unique passwords for each account you have online. It is tempting to use the same one or two passwords for all sorts of accounts to be able to remember them easily, but stop and think, if a fraudster guesses my password for my music streaming service, what other accounts can they then gain access to? Social media, emails, bank accounts?
- Set up multifactor authentication on all accounts that support it. Just a simple notification to approve or code you need to pop in can significantly reduce the ability to compromise your account.
- Try to avoid public Wi-Fi as these are vulnerable to data interception. If you do need to use it, then do not log into emails or banking facilities.
- Never give out usernames, passwords or one-time verification codes over the phone or by email to anyone, no matter who they say they are.
- No legitimate organisation will discourage you from telephoning back on a trusted number. If you are being pressured for information, anything seems out of the ordinary or you are just not sure, end the call and telephone a number you know, not one you obtain from an online search.
- Do not allow anyone to remotely connect to your device unless you have telephoned a trusted number for assistance and are certain you are speaking to a legitimate person.
- Block suspicious phone numbers and report fake emails as spam on your account.
- Never respond to an email, text or other message if you think it is false. It lets the fraudsters know they have a real number, and you are then more susceptible to receiving them. I received a message on WhatsApp from an unknown number a few weeks ago suggesting it was my mum on her new phone. I had to laugh as I blocked the number as there is no way my mum got a new phone and didn’t need me to set it up for her!
- Stop and think. Pause and take a moment before clicking on a link you think a friend has messaged you or opening an attachment to an email. Are you expecting it? Is this usual for the person to be sending? You may be cyber aware but are your friends and family? Maybe they have been compromised, and the fraudsters are using their accounts to get to you now!
We hope you found these tips useful! To keep up with the latest news from Thomson & Bancks, please follow us on Facebook, X, Instagram and LinkedIn.
