I had an email from Hillary Clinton. Seriously. Look, it says right there. You can click on it to get a larger view:
When I add her to my contacts, it clearly states it's her and you can see that official looking email address.
info@us.gov HAS to be real, right?
Well, probably not. Let's look a little deeper. What you need to find are the email headers. Headers are a hidden section in an email that show you where it came from, what route it took and what email address it was really sent from. They're found in a different way, depending who your email provider is. In this case, it's my Yahoo account. To get them, I have to click on the little downward pointing arrow next to the icon that looks like a cog. That opens up another menu. On that one, I click "View Full Header":
Scrolling down, I see a "From:" email address and a "Reply-To:" email address. Have a look at the reply to one. That shows
geithner.treasury.gov@gmail.com and not the
info@us.gov one we originally saw:
So the scammer faked the
info@us.gov one, and the real email address is the much less official
geithner.treasury.gov@gmail.com which is obviously nothing at all to do with the US Government. Now, obviously finding the headers will be different if you're using another email provider, but the basic principle is the same.
