Getting occasional messages from strange sources is a fact of life these days. And as far as the global Internet is concerned, we’re all naive children, mostly ignorant of threats that might be lurking out there.
A stranger says hello? A message alerts you to your package status when you haven’t ordered anything? On iOS, long press -> Delete -> Delete and Report Junk (or click the Report Junk hyperlink if available). Optionally, skip the report and just delete if you’re not sure. Clicking to find out is never worth the risk.
In this example, I was expecting a package and had even received email indicating shipping was delayed. So, I went ahead and clicked on the link. Just kidding. I pasted the URL into one of the websites that let you check URL’s for free (in this case urlvoid.com). The report returned zero indications of it being an unsafe URL engaged in phishing or other malware attacks. This can be the case for new URLs whether safe of not. But the server location was revealed to be in the Netherlands.
Amazon and it’s sellers are international, but I’m guessing shipping updates for a cheap XKX USB speaker shipping from a nearby Amazon warehouse in the U.S. wouldn’t be sent from a server in Amsterdam. And reverse phone lookup for this U.S. number came back empty. Any other thoughts/tips for dealing with messaging spam/phishing?