Smishing
Phishing delivered by text message — a delivery notice, a toll charge, a bank alert — designed to get you onto a fake login page.
Text works better than email for the same attack, because a phone screen hides the real destination of a link, people read texts within minutes, and the pretexts are mundane enough to be plausible: an undelivered parcel, an unpaid toll, a rejected payment.
The tell is almost always the same: the message creates a small, cheap problem with a link that fixes it. The fix is to ignore the link and go to the organisation’s app or website yourself. In the UK, scam texts can be forwarded free to 7726.
Where it shows up
- Phishing and smishing — A small, cheap problem and a link that fixes it — on a screen where you cannot see where the link goes.
- Toll and delivery texts — A tiny amount you probably do owe someone, and a link that takes your card details instead.
- QR code scams — A QR code is a link you cannot read — which is why a sticker over a real one works so well.