Think twice before you rush to enter an old friend’s March Madness pool this week. There’s nothing wrong with a little camaraderie, but the email invite might be coming from a cybercriminal looking to steal your personal information or money.

Cybersecurity researchers say the annual NCAA basketball tournament brings a slew of phishing emails from scammers looking to capitalize on the public’s eagerness to join the fun. March Madness captures widespread attention, and the yearly rush to get brackets filled out before the first game tips off adds a sense of urgency. That combination makes March Madness a slam dunk for cybercriminals. Emails mentioning the tournament have a better chance of drawing clicks from unsuspecting victims.

Online NCAA pools have been around for years, but March Madness-related phishing has become a growing problem due to the proliferation of social media and artificial intelligence. These technologies have made it much easier for criminals to write and send custom scam emails known as spear phishing. In the past, cybercriminals had to craft spear-phishing emails one by one, doing painstaking research to find the personal details needed to make emails look real. Now social media platforms provide all the personal data needed for potential victims. Artificial intelligence then automates the composition process, allowing scammers to send out millions of highly customized emails that boost their chances of a payoff.

Here are some reminders to avoid getting scammed:

Think before you click. If something doesn’t seem right about an email, just delete it—ideally before you open it. You’re better off not taking the risk.

Examine the link. Before you click on a link, try hovering your mouse over it. This will reveal the full address, which can expose signs of fraud. A “.ru” on the end, for example, means the site was created in Russia. Misspellings are another good tipoff to a fake website. If the URL says marchmadnness.com, avoid it.

Don’t open attachments. They may contain malware. Never type confidential information into a form attached to an email.

Guard your financial information. Be wary of emails asking for account numbers, credit card numbers, wire transfers, or failed transactions. There’s no reason to share such info via message or an unsecure site.

ITS will continue to simulate phishing and assign training to those most susceptible. If you believe you’ve been targeted by phishing, see Reporting a Phishing Message (How-to).

— Chris Mielke, ITS

This article is part of a series of OnCampus articles  called “About … Blackboard Learn Ultra.”  The series is designed to provide information on Blackboard Learn Ultra in small soundbites.

Blocks are the content elements that you add to organize and segment content. You can add blocks for paragraphs, images, headings, lists, videos, and more.  With blocks, you can easily edit the order of the content by reordering the blocks within a Blackboard document.

Example of Block Editing

Block editing in a syllabus would allow you to separate each of the typical sections. Using the example layout below, you could build it into 5 blocks or 13 depending on the depth of flexibility required:

1. About the course: 1) course title, 2) course description, and 3) learning objectives
2. Course environment: 4) instructor contact information, 5) meeting schedule, 6) open education resources and textbook requirements, and 7) technology requirements to be successful
3. Standard syllabus statements: 8) policies, 9) academic success resources, 10) academic honesty, etc.
4. Assessments: 11) assessment descriptions and 12) grading schemas
5. 13) Course schedule

To reorder the syllabus, click the two-direction arrow under the (…) menu of any given block and drag the block of content to drop it in the preferred order.

Block Editing Benefits

Using block editing also makes it easy to:

• Add different types of content (typed/copied-pasted content, uploaded files, HTML, and cloud documents) inline in a specified order.
• Keep your content evenly spaced and yet separated slightly to add white space without managing the formatting between sections.
• Remove blocks without editing other content on the page.
• Only editing the section of the content you want to change without disturbing the other content on the page.

How-to Build Blocks

In the Blackboard content area select the add tool (+) and Create a Document. Choose a type of content to add to the document and keep it brief (a course description or learning objectives, for example). Save that block and hover below it to add (+) another block of the same or different type. Remember to practice editing with blocks in mind by practicing simple acts like reordering the content as you see fit or removing unnecessary blocks. Learn more about creating content in Blackboard documents.

— Karly Good, ITS