ADVISORY NOTICE REGARDING SPAM EMAILS

Recently, there have been several spam emails portraying they were sent by the U.S. Department of Transportation’ s (DOT) Office of Small and Disadvantaged Business Utilization (OSDBU) or other Departmental offices. Our office does not send out Request for Proposals (RFP), Request for Information (RFI), or Invitations for Bid. If you receive an email from our office or another DOT office that doesn’t seem legit to you, DO NOT click on any links or open any documents/attachments.

"Phishing" is the most common type of cyber-attack that affects organizations. Phishing attacks can take many forms, but they all share a common goal to get individuals and business owners to share sensitive information such as login credentials, credit card information, or bank account details.

To avoid these phishing schemes, please observe the following:

• Do not click on links or attachments from senders that you do not recognize. Be especially wary of .zip or other compressed or executable file types.
• Do not provide sensitive personal information (like usernames and passwords) over email.
• Watch for email senders that use suspicious or misleading domain names.
• Inspect URLs carefully to make sure they’re legitimate and not imposter sites.
• Do not try to open any shared document that you’re not expecting to receive.

If you are in receipt of what looks like a spam email from the Department, call our office to confirm the validity of the communication at 202.366.1930, or via email at dot-osdbu@dot.gov