William Morgan
Users of the world's most popular email service are being warned about a surge in scams that exploit their phone number to gain access to their account and even break through extra layers of security.
With 1.7 billion active accounts to target, Gmail users are often singled out by scammers and hackers who use phishing and hijacking attempts to steal people's information and take over their email addresses.
In the case of this increasingly prevalent scam targeting Google customers, if you click the wrong thing, you can even lose control of your phone number, Reddit users who first flagged this issue have reported.
This con typically starts with an innocent appearing text message that states it is 'Gmail from Google', before the scammers pile on the pressure to make their victims tush to click on a 'Recover Account' link and enter their password.
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People who have received these scam texts have said that they will often intimate that your account has already been compromised.
This can include references to previous attempts at logging in from countries like Venezuela or Bangladesh, the Mail reports.
Once users enter their password into this scam password recovery website, which is spoofed to look like an authentic Google website, the hackers have access to everything and can even break through your two-factor authentication.
When these cyber criminals gain access to your email account, they will often attempt to use 'social engineering' to further infiltrate every aspect of your life. This can include using your personal details to convince cell carriers to transfer your number to their own SIM.
Once they have done this, any further password recovery links for any of your other online profiles will instead go to their phone rather than your own. Meaning they have everything. All of it.
But there are some pretty straightforward and simple ways that you can protect your Gmail account from being hijacked by hackers.
Before getting technical, the best and simplest way to avoid having your account taken over is to just never click on suspicious links, or respond to unexpected messages that don't address you directly.
The biggest giveaway to beware is when a suspicious email or text creates a sense of urgency or threat, a common tactic used by scammers.
But lots of these cons have become increasingly sophisticated and hard to spot, so you might want to take more extreme measures. These include making sure that your phone number cannot be hijacked.
To do this, you have to contact your plan provider and ask them to enable additional security steps on your account, which can include creating a PIN for your SIM, or simply placing a lock on the number being transferred.
Cybersecurity experts told the Mail that you should not have to change your number if you have strong two-factor authentication in place on your account, which can be setup easily in your Gmail settings.
However, if you 'start noticing interruptions' to your cell service with no explanation, that could be a sign that your SIM has been swapped and you should contact your provider to change your number.