Phishing Link hyperlinked over a Valid Link

Question

I sent an email to my wife with a Google Drive folder link yesterday.
I sent the email via Gmail and she opened it in her desktop Outlook email client

When you look at the link in her email the link text is correct.
https://drive.google.com etc

When you hover over the link it actually hyperlinks to
drivegoogle instead of drive.google

I can't figure out how they could do this.

The link in my sent folder in Gmail is correct.

I am trying to figure out if there is some malware or other threat in Outlook.

Any ideas?

Answer 1

I'll be watching the thread if you have any updates.

-- Diane

Answer 2

Thanks Diane.

I will keep an eye on it.

Answer 3

When she clicked on the first hyperlink and it went to drivegoogle it opened some type of phishing popup and said your computer is compromised click here to get McAfee now.

I'm not surprised that happened because someone registered drivegoogle.com domain. Bad guys will do that because they know people will typo the address when they type it in.

As to what caused the dot to be removed- we'll never know for sure but if you but are using antivirus software and keeping it updated, it's probably not malware.

Answer 4

Thank Diane.

She uses Norton to on the receiving PC.

I sent her another email with correct link again and the link was correct in Outlook that time.

I did double check in the original message I sent from Gmail and in the second email I sent from Gmail. Both show the correct link on my side but the first one hyperlinked to the drivegoogle site even though the text of the link was correct with drive.google.

When she clicked on the first hyperlink and it went to drivegoogle it opened some type of phishing popup and said your computer is compromised click here to get McAfee now.

Answer 5

Hi, I'm Diane and I'm happy to help you today.

I doubt it was actual malware. What do you use for antivirus / security software? If not Defender and it scans outgoing email (or incoming on your wife's computer), it could have removed the dot. Mcafee will do this - possibly Norton too. I usually hear about it because it removed the dot from the font size so the fonts are huge.

Let me know how it goes, I'm here to help you further if needed.

-- Diane