Kean Tak, a professor of IT and the head of IT engineering at the Royal University of Phnom Penh, says that there are many techniques hackers use to deceive people. He said what Povleakhena has experienced is one of the most common ways that an email user can be hacked.

He advises web users that when they receive this kind of email from a friend, he or she should contact that friend personally by using other media, such as Facebook, Skpye, Line or phone to verify the truth.

There are other internet scams, of course. The professor also says to be particularly wary if you receive an email from a stranger offering you millions of dollars if you contact his lawyer and do as they request. Such an email is clearly a scam or a hoax.

Any time you receive such an email, you should be skeptical and not let greed interfere with common sense.

To prevent hackers from getting your personal information, he suggests that before you register for at a website or give a site information about yourself, you should first find out more about the website. He says a Google search about the website may help you discover if it is legitimate or if it is a ploy just to get your details. And always make sure that you have gone to the website you intended. Some hackers, Tak says, create a fake site to look like a real site. For example, if you mistype facebook.com, you may find that you have been taken to a site that looks exactly like the real Facebook so that when you try to log in, the web page operator will now know your Facebook account details.

The professor also warns users to be very careful before buying something online. One way to ascertain whether a site is secure and safe to give credit card numbers to is if the website is preceded by “https” (the S stands for secure). If a website does have an https, it is a site you can trust and be certain your information won’t get to others who might try to cheat you.