If you get an email about your student loan, with this subject line (or similar):

• Important loan information from SFE

It is likely to be fraudulent. Do not click links or reply to it.

The Student Finance England logo may be included to make it look convincing.

If you think an email about your loan is genuine and need to take action:

• Go to the student loan company’s website yourself instead of clicking on email links (if you know the web address, type it in manually – or find their website using a search engine). From their homepage you should be able to find what you need.
• Why is this necessary? Because even if links look genuine, they may go somewhere else when clicked.

Fake emails are regularly received by staff and students from malicious sources (who want your username and password, financial/personal data, or want to plant virusues). We take action to block them, but some still get through.

The University will never ask for your password by email.

Fakes can look very convincing, with a ‘from’ address looks genuine and official: if you have entered your Kent password into a website that may be fraudulent, change your Kent password immediately and contact us.

Tips on staying safe:

• never send passwords by email
• if you’re worried your password may have been compromised, contact us and change your password immediately
• don’t click on links: manually type the web address into a web browser instead, or search for the main website and navigate from there.
• don’t open attachments unless you’re sure they are from a trusted source.

If you are suspicious at all about a message, but feel it may be genuine, please contact us for advice.

Fake email sent to students at York recently:

From: Student Finance England

Date: 14 October 2014 17:00
Subject: Important loan information from SFE
To: studentloan.listserve@york.ac.uk

Dear student,

We have noticed that your account has not completed the required update necessary for future payments by the Student Loan Company. To ensure that your payment is not delayed, please kindly update your account to the newest version standard by submitting your details we have on record via the secure webpage below.

Link to: ‘Secure update page’ (which was a fraudulent link and NOT to the Studentfinanceengland).

We apologise for any inconvenience.

Sincerely,
Student Loan Company