The email account of a Corvallis City Councilor was hijacked Wednesday, and used to send a potential phishing scam to over 3,400 email addresses.
The message appeared to be from Councilor Paul Shaffer. It prompted recipients to click on a ShareFile link, download a PDF, and enter their Microsoft log-in credentials.
Corvallis Public Information Officer Patrick Rollens said it’s not yet clear how scammers accessed Shaffer’s email, but the city’s IT department is looking into it.
“We got some kind of bewildered emails from community members," said Rollens. "Thankfully, a lot of those folks had not clicked the link and had very wisely deleted the email. So that’s just generally good internet hygiene to be pretty skeptical about links like that.”
The city sent a follow-up email warning all of the recipients of the scam. It said people who gave out their credentials should change their passwords, and watch for unusual activity on their accounts.
Rollens said so far, the city is not aware of any other officials' emails that have been compromised.
