IT Security News

Your place for finding out about APSU IT Security projects, initiatives, alerts, and other cybersecurity information.

12/1/2022 Stay alert for “Spoofed” emails!

Have you ever received an email from someone on campus and noticed that they it was tagged with the [External] flag? Have you ever received an email from yourself that you didn’t send? If so you probably have been the recipient of an email spoofing attack.

Recently IT Security has noted an increase in spoofing emails being sent to APSU faculty. It’s important to keep in mind that emails can be “spoofed”.  This is a way hackers can make an email look like it’s coming from someone you know. If something seems off about an email you have received, double check who the email was actually sent from. With email, there are two places to look to determine who the mail is from. The first place is the “friendly name”; this will typically just look like the person’s name and is relatively easy to fake. Instead of looking there, you should turn your attention to the actual email address that the mail was received from.  For an external email this can be found to the right of the person’s name bracketed with less than and greater than signs. John Doe <john.doe@example.com>.  For internal emails you will need to click on the name in order to see what address the email originated from.  Pay special attention to any email that has an [External] flag on it, these emails are tagged to have come from outside of Austin Peay. If you have any questions about a particular email, please forward it to apitsecurity@apsu.edu so we can assist in identifying whether an email is safe.