December 3, 2009

State Public Health Director Warns Public of H1N1 Phishing E-mail Scam

Fraudulent e-mails circulating throughout country referencing non-existent CDC-sponsored state vaccination program 

SPRINGFIELD, Ill. – Dr. Damon T. Arnold, Director of the Illinois Department of Public Health, is alerting Illinoisans to a nationwide H1N1 phishing e-mail scam. The fraudulent e-mails (phishing) claim to be from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and reference a CDC sponsored State Vaccination Program. The messages request that users must create a personal H1N1 (swine flu) Vaccination Profile on the CDC Web site. The message then states that anyone 18 years or older has to create a personal Vaccination Profile on the CDC Web site.

The Illinois Department of Public Health encourages anyone who receives these e-mails to delete them immediately as the CDC has NOT implemented a state vaccination program requiring registration on www.cdc.gov. Users that click on the e-mail are at risk of having malicious code installed on their system.

People should take the following steps to reduce the risk of being a victim of this or other phishing attacks:

• Do not follow unsolicited links and do not open or respond to unsolicited email messages.
• Use caution when visiting un-trusted Web sites.
• Use caution when entering personal information online.

An example of the Phishing e-mail follows: