There's a reason why we don't have to dial "911748596327485964" in case of emergency!

Here's an annoying trend that I've discovered recently. We're all aware, I assume, of "phishing" scams, and I'm often reading stuff in the news or in WIRED or wherever about how ubiquitous these types of scams are. That being the case, I try to be very diligent in reporting phishing e-mails to the appropriate companies every time I receive one.

The problem is, lots of companies make it entirely too difficult to do this. If phishing scams are that big of a problem for consumers and that big of an annoyance for companies, then it seems to me a simple link, right on the front page, saying something like "Report suspicious e-mails here" would be in order. But, in order to track down the phishing report e-mail address for Amazon, I first had to click "Contact Us" way at the bottom of the front page; then I had to read through the linked page for the link to their Security page; and then there was yet another link to a page about phishing scams. That's where I found the address, buried deep in the middle of the page and not even in bold text to stand out. Ugh. And there are other companies for whom I've received phishing e-mails (many of which I don't even do business with in the first place) where I was unable to find any kind of spoof-reporting instructions at all.

Encouraging people like me to do the right thing works better, folks, if you make it easier for people like me to do the right thing.

(Oh, and if any of my readers are receiving Amazon spoof e-mails, forward them to stop-spoofing@amazon.com.)