With the global COVID-19 crisis, we have seen a surge of misinformation and baseless claims falsely associated with many leading health-care institutions worldwide. Unfortunately, external users have been receiving phishing emails claiming to be from the UHN Research domain. These emails do not originate from UHN Research or any affiliated parties.
To raise awareness about this issue, and to coincide with Cyber Security Awareness Month, research at UHN has launched a phishing education webpage for external users.
Visit the site by clicking on the following link: Protect Yourself from Spam & Phishing
Note that the spam and phishing awareness web page is relevant for individuals who do not work at UHN and appear to be receiving spam from uhnresearch.ca. If UHN patients, volunteers or collaborators are receiving spam emails, they are encouraged to contact UHN Digital through internal routes.
We are actively working to better understand how our domain names are being misused and to secure our domain name so we can halt these emails at their source. UHN Digital is working to centralize our outbound mail channels and publish domain reputation information that will allow internet service providers to differentiate legitimate emails from spam emails.
As a not-for-profit public hospital, UHN never sends unsolicited emails or advertises products or services to patients or the general public. By providing users with tools to help spot phishing emails, we hope to empower users to safeguard their personal information from fraudsters.
