The e-mail usually says there is a problem with your account and provides a link to a website to update your information. People are lured into going to that site and revealing personal and account information.

The main thing to keep in mind is that financial institutions don’t do that. If you receive such an e-mail you automatically know it is a fraud. Still, it traps a lot of people.

The new twist is Internet sales of user friendly do-it-yourself kits that allow users to easily replicate financial institution e-mail headers and websites. After these kits started showing up in the second half of 2009 it coincided with a 77% spike in phishing activity. Phishing is bigger than ever. Be careful, and remember the key point that financial institutions don’t send such e-mails.

Wire Fraud: A new wire transfer fraud has recently popped up nationwide. The crooks have a lot of personally identifying information to begin with (not sure of their means of getting it) like social security and account numbers.

This fraud mostly targets people who have home equity lines of credit. The crook first takes a loan advance deposited into their savings or checking account. They follow up with a request for a wire transfer to an account at another institution.

The normal practice of call-back verification of the wire request doesn’t provide protection. As part of this scam the crook takes over or forwards the victim’s phone number. Incoming and outgoing calls at the bank or credit union appear to be from and to the victim’s actual phone number.

This is a tough one. It’s up to institutions to put in place additional methods of verification for wire transfers.