Stay one step ahead of the fraudsters

The Community Foundation and its grantees are occasionally targeted by fraudsters.  Whilst some may operate by telephone or mail, they usually prefer to work online. Some of the fake emails we have seen look very convincing and may even have come from hacked accounts. So we’d ask all our grantees to be on the alert, and take three simple precautions:

1. Use a strong password – Fraudsters have a list of all the common ones (e.g. “Password123”). They will check your website and social media for clues as to ones you might use (e.g. “CommunityFoundation”). We recommend you use three well-chosen but random words (e.g. “ChinaCatSunflower”). These can be easy to remember, but very hard to guess! For more information see: https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/blog-post/three-random-words-or-thinkrandom-0;
2. Make sure you have antivirus software on your computer – There’s more information on protecting yourself from viruses and malware here: https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/guidance/protecting-your-organisation-malware
3. Learn more about protecting your organisation from fraud at https://www.actionfraud.police.uk.

Finally if you get an email from the Community Foundation, and something doesn’t strike you as quite right, please do call us to confirm its genuine on 0191 222 0945. Better to be safe than sorry!