Online scammers want you to trick you into revealing confidential or sensitive information to them, providing financial details, providing opportunities for them to install malicious software on your devices. They do that largely through putting messages and links before you that look trustworthy. But if you are not expecting a message from a usually trusted source, such as your bank (or from a bank with which you do not bank!) – do not click!
If a link looks like it might be legitimate, it’s possible scammers have made the link look like one thing, when it is really configured to be another. To determine if what a link looks like really links to what it says it is, there are ways to examine that link without clicking on it. Here are a couple of articles that explain how to do this, while using a mouse or pointer on your computer or pointing on your phone.
- How to Hover Over a Link to Check It’s Not a Scam (from Ask Leo!)
- Do Not Click Any Of These Links On Your Smartphone, Warns Google (from Forbes)