This afternoon, we were made aware that malicious actors have made a uniquely frustrating attempt to fraud Crowder employees using personal cell phone numbers and SMS text messages.    

Al and Daniel truly appreciate everyone alerting us to phishing attempts and other malicious concerns.  It really helps make a difference in protecting our people and Crowder.  

The attacker begins with a text message to an employee’s personal cell phone, beginning with "[your name] and ending with the name of a Crowder administrator or supervisor.  By naming you and someone at Crowder, the malicious is using a classic social engineering technique.  Social engineering is a malicious attempt to manipulate you. 

At this point, today's text campaign came from a phone number with a 508 area code.  If you receive this or a similar text, please report it to HelpDesk at www.crowder.edu/ticket, Help@crowder.edu, or 417-455-5712.  

Below is a screenshot of one of the attempts from earlier this afternoon.