DVSA Update: Phishing email warning

DVSA has been made aware of a phishing email pretending to be from them asking for your address and postcode, date of birth and ADI personal reference numbers. DVSA only asks for this information if:

• you have registered a new online business service account
• you’re asking them to lift a suspension on your account

A genuine email from DVSA requesting this information would be sent from system.administrator@dvsa.gov.uk

If you receive an email asking for this information and you are unsure if it is from DVSA, do not respond but forward it by email to system.administrator@dvsa.gov.uk to check if the email was sent from them.

Help DVSA to catch the culprits

If you have received the phishing email and have responded with your details, it is important that you let DVSA know by contacting system.administrator@dvsa.gov.uk.

DVSA can then look to see if an account has been set up using your details and take action to protect you, close the account and take action against the fraudsters.

You should also report any scam emails to The National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC), which is the government agency that works to protect individuals and businesses from the threat of cyber-attacks. You can do this through their website.

Reporting phishing emails to NCSC not only helps the individuals involved, but alerts the agency to emerging threats which they can investigate on behalf of others too.

Tips for spotting phishing emails

There are some simple tips you can use to help spot phishing emails.

• Check you recognise the email address the message has been sent ‘From’ and that it has been spelt correctly.
• If the email address isn’t shown in full, hover over it with your mouse and it will show the full address, if it is not from an address you recognise or spelt incorrectly it’s unlikely to be genuine
• Often phishing emails have bad grammar or spelling mistakes, so check that the email reads correctly and that there are no spelling mistakes
• If there are any links in the email, make sure that they go to the website you expect them to. If the link is from text within the email, hover your mouse over it so you can see the link the words will take you to

In addition to the NCSC site, you can find more information on how to spot phishing emails at Scam emails | Action Fraud.