Phishing emails, texts and calls, and how to tell a real message from bait

Phishing is a message pretending to be someone you trust so you'll click, sign in, pay or share something. It shows up as email, text messages (sometimes called smishing), phone calls (vishing), social media DMs and QR codes. The name changes. The trick doesn't.

What makes phishing work isn't technical skill. It's timing and pressure. A final notice from a toll road. A delivery text the week you're expecting a package. A message from your boss's name asking you to buy gift cards before a meeting.

This section breaks phishing into the parts anyone can check: who really sent it, where the link really goes, what it's asking you to do, and how to confirm it through a channel the message didn't give you. We also cover what to do after you've clicked, because that happens to careful people too, and the first hour matters most.