First Direct Switch to Paperless email

OceanSound

Did you receive an email from 'first Direct' a couple of days ago asking to switch all your statements to paperless?

It looks like this:


Slightly concerned the authenticity because I switched to paperless a while ago.Possible phishing email? Probably not, because the email has part of my postcode at bottom. Still thought I'd flag it.

OceanSound

email is genuine. If in doubt, one of the things to check is the sender's email address.
FD says this:

If we contact you by email, we will never ask you to enter or confirm your security details. We will only send you emails from the following email addresses: 24hours@firstdirect.com, important@information.firstdirect.com, email@email.firstdirect.com, 24hours@mail.firstdirect.com, and newsletter@mail.firstdirect.com.

email in OP came from: important@information.firstdirect.com

and it had part of my postcode. All this put together, it must be genuine.

EachPenny

OceanSound wrote: »

email is genuine. If in doubt, one of the things to check is the sender's email address.

Checking an email address is not a very reliable way of confirming an email is genuine. It might confirm it is fraudulent (if the address is obviously wrong) but there are a number of ways the scammers can present the victim with what appears to be a 'genuine' email address used by the organisation the message is supposed to be from.

OceanSound

EachPenny wrote: »

Checking an email address is not a very reliable way of confirming an email is genuine. It might confirm it is fraudulent (if the address is obviously wrong) but there are a number of ways the scammers can present the victim with what appears to be a 'genuine' email address used by the organisation the message is supposed to be from.

What about correct email address and part of my post code mentioned on email?
I guess scammers could have obtained that also somehow?

In addition to watching out for badly designed emails with spelling mistakes, typos, and specifically asking for security info. What other reliable ways can you suggest?

BTW: Do you think the email in my OP is a phishing email?

greyteam1959

I would not click on it.

RG2015

EachPenny wrote: »

Checking an email address is not a very reliable way of confirming an email is genuine. It might confirm it is fraudulent (if the address is obviously wrong) but there are a number of ways the scammers can present the victim with what appears to be a 'genuine' email address used by the organisation the message is supposed to be from.

Hi EachPenny,

I have heard about scammers presenting a 'genuine' phone number on a phone but not an email address. I received an email yesterday from "noreply@email.firstdirect.com" advising me that my statement was available to view. I would always trust that this was a genuine email address but would be interested to know how this could be presented by a scammer.

Also, this is not one of the email addresses quoted by OceanSound but as my new statement had just been produced that I am confident that it is genuine.

RG2015

I have also just seen this in an email (about emails for statement notifications) I received from FD on 15th Feb 2018:

"As you may already know, we normally include the last 3 digits of your postcode at the end of our emails so you know it is from us. Unfortunately we have encountered a pesky technical hitch so we will not be able to include the 3 digits to start with, but you will still see them in all our other emails as usual."

takman

RG2015 wrote: »

Hi EachPenny,

I have heard about scammers presenting a 'genuine' phone number on a phone but not an email address. I received an email yesterday from "noreply@email.firstdirect.com" advising me that my statement was available to view. I would always trust that this was a genuine email address but would be interested to know how this could be presented by a scammer.

Also, this is not one of the email addresses quoted by OceanSound but as my new statement had just been produced that I am confident that it is genuine.

When you send an email it is extremely easy to choose what email address you want it to look like it comes from. If you search on Google you will easily find many sites where you simply fill out the too and from addresses to send an email like this.

You should never trust an email based purely on the address it came from.

RG2015

takman wrote: »

When you send an email it is extremely easy to choose what email address you want it to look like it comes from. If you search on Google you will easily find many sites where you simply fill out the too and from addresses to send an email like this.

You should never trust an email based purely on the address it came from.

Thank you.

Is there any way of checking the true email address for received emails?

takman

RG2015 wrote: »

Thank you.

Is there any way of checking the true email address for received emails?

You can look at the email header (how to view this will depend on how you are viewing your email and what provide you are using) and this will give some information on the origin of the email. But won't actually give you a "real" email address that you can send and email to for example, at best you will get the details of the server it was sent from.

ValiantSon

I had the e-mail and I ignored it. If it is a phishing e-mail then obviously I don't want to have anything to do with it, and if it isn't I'm not interested in paperless statements anyway.