Blogbuzz

Y’know, I honestly think I see something like ten to twenty of these things a day and because of that I normally delete them without a second glance. In fact, most of the time Thunderbird’s junk filter gets them and the only time I actually see them is when I’m clearing out the junk mail folder. Today I got to thinking about it and asking myself “why is it that people still try this kind of email scam when it’s so obviously crap?”. The answer was immediately obvious. “Because it works.”

Only an insane person continues to devote time, money and effort to pursue something that doesn’t work. That means that there are plenty of people around that will believe these emails are real and buy into the scam. Eventually of course, they find out that it wasn’t real but usually only after their identity has been stolen, their bank accounts cleaned out and credit cards maxed out and they’re left with nothing but a mountain of debt, a lousy credit rating and no idea how they’re going to fix the situation. Because of that, I’m going to go over one such email that I received this afternoon.

Red flag #1:

Subject: FINAL NOTIFICATION!!!!!!!!!!!!

Excessive use of exclamation points or other punctuation in the subject line. A genuine email *might* use one, perhaps two if they’re realy pushing it. Also, the subject in all caps is suspect as well. While some do have a habit of shouting their subject, most legitimate “offcial” type emails I’ve seen avoid the practice entirely.

Red flag #2:

To: undisclosed-recipients: ;

If this email is supposedly TO me, why is my email address not on the TO: line? The use of “undisclosed-recipients” means that the email was sent to a large numer of people at once.

Red flag #3:

From: “Hewlett Packard”
Reply-To:

The From and Reply-To: are set to different addresses and the Reply-To is set to a free webmail address instead of a corporate address at hp.com. Since the Reply-To field is where any replies will go unless you change it when you reply, this is a good way to keep replies from being sent to the From address since most of the time people will simply hit reply, type their message and send it.

Red flag #4:

Dear Sir/Madam,

Interesting. Somebody knows me enough know my email address and have something life changing for me but doesn’t know if I’m a Sir or Madam? The bullshit detector is already nearly pegged and we haven’t gotten into the main part of their message yet.

It is obvious that this notification came to you as a surprise, but please finds time to read it carefully as we congratulate you over your success in the following official publication of results of the e-mail electronic online draw held by Hewlett Packard

1) Use of “please finds time to”. It’s a small thing, but one that’s indicative of a writer that doensn’t use English as a primary language.

2) A real message like this would probably be some type of “canned” message with the specific details filled in before sending.

3) Lotteries and many other contests that I’ve ever paid any attetion to are fond of telling people “You can’t win if you don’t enter” and they’re right. I cannot possibly have won this event because I have never entered it.

Red flag #5:

In promotion to our Hardware & Software Products {H.S.P.} your email address emerged as one of the online winning emails in the 1st category and therefore attracted a cash award of Ј750.000.00 (Seven Hundred And Fifty Thousand Pounds Sterling). Our winnings are arranged in three categories with different prizes accorded to each category.

1) Once again there’s this pesky little detail of my not having entered in any such contest n the first place.

2) Any contest, sweepstakes, drawing or whatever that I DO actually enter will be paying any and all cash prizes in U.S. Dollars. I’ve nothing against Pounds Stirling, it’s just that with me being an American and living in the U.S. of A., Pounds Stirling means only the expense and trouble of getting it converted to Dollars.

Red flag #6:

Therefore we write to officially notify you of this award and also direct you to contact the following department for your claims award. And in other to facilitate your claiming process, you are required to send them the following personal information for your cash payment processing.

v Your Full Names:
v copy of drivers license or international passport or any other legal means of identification.
v Contact Address.
v Mobile Telephone Number:
v Fax numbers (optional):
v Nationality/Country:
v Date of Birth:
v Age/Sex:
v Occupation:

NEVER and I do mean NEVER answer an email that’s requesting information like this! If you suspect that it **MIGHT** be legitimate or from a website that you’re a member of, check it out with the site.

DO NOT USE LINKS PROVIDED IN THE EMAIL!!

Instead, log in to the site as you normally would. Preferably by typing it’s address into your browser yourself. Most sites, such as ebay or PayPal, will notify you automatically when you log in if any information is needed or has to be updated. They will NOT send you an email asking for the information.

Legitimate contests or anyone that you have actually done business with will NOT ask you for information like this, EVER.

The reason for this is that given the information requested above, stealing your identity becomes very easy. Like taking candy from a baby. They can then clean out your bank accounts, obtain your credit information and run up monstrous debts overnight and worse, far worse.

Another note, legitimate companies DO NOT send emails such as the one described above. If your email program has junk filtering ability, turn it on and take the time to correct it when it marks something wrong. Over time this “training” will allow that junk filter to save you a lot of time and trouble.

Technorati Tags: email scam, bogus email, spam, identity theft, credit card fraud