| Pages in topic: [1 2] > | New Scam Warning!!! Thread poster: Lincoln Silveira (X)
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Lincoln Silveira (X)
Brazil
Local time: 09:26
English to Portuguese
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Dear All,
I opened my mailbox this morning to check the usual load of messages and as I went through the e-garbage folder I came across yet another scam message.
It has been a long time since I stopped being annoyed by this. I used to get a lot of this in the past, only that they were from the African strain. Now the guys seem to have moved farther to the East as the scammer claims to be a LP in Malaysia.
What is really annoying and of concern is that the p... See more Dear All,
I opened my mailbox this morning to check the usual load of messages and as I went through the e-garbage folder I came across yet another scam message.
It has been a long time since I stopped being annoyed by this. I used to get a lot of this in the past, only that they were from the African strain. Now the guys seem to have moved farther to the East as the scammer claims to be a LP in Malaysia.
What is really annoying and of concern is that the person OBVIOUSLY harvested my contact information from my ProZ.com profile (i.e. the emails to which the person sent his/her message are indicated in my CV/résumé posted with ProZ.com). I urge the site staff to look into this matter with the earnest attention to prevent harm will come to users. I know at least one registered user in my language pair that has had to change his contact info and site name because of spammers/hackers.
He scam message and email are below, FYI.
(Sender is Patel Velo, [email protected])
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Attn: Mr. Lincoln Macedo Silveira,
It’s my pleasure sending you this mail today you today. How is your health which is the most important thing to me hope you’re doing good.
My name is Barr. Patel Velo, I am a legal practitioner PATEL VELO Chamber in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. I saw your contact and profile; I decided that you could cooperate with me in this proposition. I have a client who were in after shall be referred to as my client died together with his family in December 24-2004 as a result of the Tsunami Disaster, I am contacting you because you have the same surname as my late client and I felt that you could help me in the distribution of funding that were left in my late client's bank account. This funding is closed to be declared UN-serviceable by the bank as there were no indicated next of kin or next of beneficiary of the fund in the bank account. The total amount of cash in the bank account of my deceased client is US$8.2 Million (Say, Eight Million, Two Hundred Thousand United State Dollars) only.
The bank had issued to me a notification to contact the next of kin of my late client for either to re-activate the bank account or to make claim of beneficiary, of the funding in the bank account, with a month surcharge of 6% to be deducted as closure of the bank account.
My proposition to you is to seek your consent, and to present your kind self as the next-of-kin and beneficiary of my late client, since you have the same last name with him. This means that the proceeds of his bank account would be paid to you as his next of kin or the legitimate beneficiary. When the proceeds in his an Escrow safe keeping fee of the bank account, so as to avoid the indefinite bank account are paid to you, we would share the proceeds on a mutually agreed-upon percentage of 60% to me and 40% to your kind self.
All the legal documents to back up your claim as my client's next-of-kin would be provided by me. The most important thing I would need is your honest cooperation in this proposition. This would be done under a legitimate arrangement that would protect you from any breach of the law.
If this business proposition offends your moral and ethic values, do accept my sincere apology. If you're interested by replying the mail and ignore it if you are not.
Best regards,
Bar. Patel Velo Esq ▲ Collapse
| | | | | How to check them | Mar 26, 2008 |
I have got at least 15 such fake e-mails after I got registered as member of Proz.com. One very interesting thing is that so many persons are inviting me to get a huge amount of money left by someone who either died in an air accident or was missing from long time. The more interesting past is that all the persons sending me such e-mail are from some Bank of Africa, Burkina Faso. I am surprised to see that within two months of being paid member of Proz.com, I suddenly started getting offers of ... See more I have got at least 15 such fake e-mails after I got registered as member of Proz.com. One very interesting thing is that so many persons are inviting me to get a huge amount of money left by someone who either died in an air accident or was missing from long time. The more interesting past is that all the persons sending me such e-mail are from some Bank of Africa, Burkina Faso. I am surprised to see that within two months of being paid member of Proz.com, I suddenly started getting offers of millions of dollars or pounds from the Bank of Africa, Burkina Faso. All the incidents are different, persons sending e-mails are different, amounts offered are also different, the only thing which remains same is the Bank and its location. Everytime I put them into spam but again I get more. like you, I am still confused how to tackle and check them. Perhaps some other person may suggest something special. ▲ Collapse
| | | | | Avoiding Scam | Mar 26, 2008 |
In both cases, your email addresses are visible to all in your resumes. When you put such data in a document that will be visible to all, you must be expecting to receive scam, spam, advertising and offers of all sorts. There's nothing that will differentiate a potential client visit and a potential scammer visit.
This has nothing to do with ProZ.com per se, the data that you have entered in your profile, but are set not to be visible to all, are secure.
ProZ.com offers... See more In both cases, your email addresses are visible to all in your resumes. When you put such data in a document that will be visible to all, you must be expecting to receive scam, spam, advertising and offers of all sorts. There's nothing that will differentiate a potential client visit and a potential scammer visit.
This has nothing to do with ProZ.com per se, the data that you have entered in your profile, but are set not to be visible to all, are secure.
ProZ.com offers a built-in email system that allows receiving messages without displaying the email addresses to the sender - the little yellow envelope at the top of your profiles. Why not use that?
For instance:
Contact: 
It won't prevent *any* unsolicited mail to reach you (they still can fill the form), but at least it would avoid the propagation of your email addresses to bulk email senders.
Outside ProZ.com (on your own sites, etc.) there is similarly a possibility to set up dialogue boxes (using cgiemail or other systems).
In any case, don't hesitate sending the full e-mail to a moderator if you think that the site has been abused to send you unsolicited emails.
Florence "Oddie"
[Modifié le 2008-03-26 14:24] ▲ Collapse
| | | | John Di Rico 
France
Local time: 14:26
Member (2006)
French to English
| Hide your address | Mar 26, 2008 |
A low-tech solution would be to "hide" your address. You can do this by writing your e-mail address with mistakes in it, making it obvious to a human what they have to do in order to correct it. For example, janedoeNOSPAMyahoo.com or janedoeREPLACE_WITH_ATyahoo.com
I don't know if spammers have written smart enough code to get around this. They did manage to hijack my PHP "request a q... See more A low-tech solution would be to "hide" your address. You can do this by writing your e-mail address with mistakes in it, making it obvious to a human what they have to do in order to correct it. For example, janedoeNOSPAMyahoo.com or janedoeREPLACE_WITH_ATyahoo.com
I don't know if spammers have written smart enough code to get around this. They did manage to hijack my PHP "request a quote" form which really pissed me off (http://www.apextra.fr/english/quote.htm). I'm looking for a solution, anyone have any ideas?
John ▲ Collapse
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| do they work? | Mar 26, 2008 |
Does anyone know if someone has actually fallen for one these scams? It seems anyone who receives one knows it's bogus, so I wonder why the senders are so persistent?
| | | | Lincoln Silveira (X)
Brazil
Local time: 09:26
English to Portuguese
+ ...
TOPIC STARTER | Oh yes they have fallen... | Mar 26, 2008 |
WilRoy wrote:
Does anyone know if someone has actually fallen for one these scams? It seems anyone who receives one knows it's bogus, so I wonder why the senders are so persistent?
Will (and anyone else interested, for that matter),
I know of at least one case where this Australian farmer got himself into a bit of trouble after traveling to an African country in the hopes of meeting his Internet sweetheart penpal.
| | | | | Here are the stats and other info | Mar 26, 2008 |
WilRoy wrote:
Does anyone know if someone has actually fallen for one these scams? It seems anyone who receives one knows it's bogus, so I wonder why the senders are so persistent?
http://www.nigeria419scam.com
| | | | Lincoln Silveira (X)
Brazil
Local time: 09:26
English to Portuguese
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TOPIC STARTER | Threw line and bait on this one... | Mar 26, 2008 |
José Henrique Lamensdorf wrote: WilRoy wrote:
Does anyone know if someone has actually fallen for one these scams? It seems anyone who receives one knows it's bogus, so I wonder why the senders are so persistent? http://www.nigeria419scam.com
Ahahaha, José, so you know them too, eh?
In fact, I decided to have a little bit of fun with this one. I replied him back with my own "bait". I said I could help him but right off the bat REQUIRED him start producing some paperwork before I could be of any help, because, as a lawyer like him, I am under legal requirement and such and such.
So far no answer from our legal practitioner.
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Nikolaj Widenmann
United States
Local time: 06:26
Member (2007)
Danish to English
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| My rich unknown relative died in an airline crash | Mar 26, 2008 |
I, too, was contacted by a Malaysian attorney-at-law. Here is my story that I contributed to a recent forum post: http://www.proz.com/post/796814#796814
| | | | | Scam reversal | Mar 26, 2008 |
Ahahaha, José, so you know them too, eh?[/quote]
Sure, I get this type of spam every single day... sometimes in German, of which I understand gar nichts. But their English is always worth a good laugh!
I read once the quite amusing story of someone who actually managed to get some money from one such scammer, and thus meekly reverse the scam. I think search engines might get you there.
| | | | | You would be surprised | Mar 26, 2008 |
by the number of intelligent people have fallen for scam messages. There has been a case involving a Czech GP couple of years ago who swallowed the bait. But he went a bit further than most people did and would go, and murdered the Nigerian bastard. Unfortunately for the physician, the scammer was an employee of the Nigerian embassy in the Czech Rep., so there was an interesting international incident.
| | | | Lincoln Silveira (X)
Brazil
Local time: 09:26
English to Portuguese
+ ...
TOPIC STARTER
José Henrique Lamensdorf wrote:
...
I read once the quite amusing story of someone who actually managed to get some money from one such scammer, and thus meekly reverse the scam. I think search engines might get you there.
You probably read it here: http://www.419eater.com/
There are many amusing stories. I once read one where a guy (the original intended victim) faked to be the head of a project dealing with handwriting studies. He then enticed and lured the scammer into completing a full handwritten copy of one of the Harry Potter books to help in the project and, of course, in exchange for some fat fee.
Essentially, the poor devil (actual victim of a reversed scam, maybe somebody else) had the tabled turned on him and fell victim to the very greed he was trying to exploit in the beginning.
As I said, I will try my hand at this scambaiting game. I threw some legal mumbo jumbo on my Malaysian 'colleague', asking him to complete some red tape before I can help him out laying his little hands on that heap of money. Will see what happens, hehe.
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Henry Hinds
United States
Local time: 06:26
English to Spanish
+ ...
In memoriam
We all have a delete button, that's what I use, I get that kind of stuff almost every day and just delete it.
| | | | | A different type of scam I encountered recently | Mar 27, 2008 |
I was trying to sell some items that I didn't need anymore on a French website (one of those classified ads websites, not ebay). One of the potential purchasers replied to my ad in a strange way ... didn't attempt to negotiate the price, asked for my full address to send me a check in $USD, etc. His/Her French was rather bad, and I was beginning to feel a little suspicious about the whole thing.
After exchanging several e-mails, the scammer finally tried his/her thing ... in fa... See more I was trying to sell some items that I didn't need anymore on a French website (one of those classified ads websites, not ebay). One of the potential purchasers replied to my ad in a strange way ... didn't attempt to negotiate the price, asked for my full address to send me a check in $USD, etc. His/Her French was rather bad, and I was beginning to feel a little suspicious about the whole thing.
After exchanging several e-mails, the scammer finally tried his/her thing ... in fact, a friend of his who owed him money was going to send me the check, and I was to cash the check and mail the goods + extra cash to him! And it was very urgent, had to be done that very weekend ... I smelled something rotten and immediately cut off communication.
Scammers are out there, all over it seems. One can't be too careful. ▲ Collapse
| | | | Joan Berglund
United States
Local time: 08:26
Member (2008)
French to English
| my email is not in resume but I was contacted | Mar 28, 2008 |
My email is not in my resume, although I am set to accept emails through ProZ. I recently got an email through ProZ saying since I am a fitness professional blah blah blah. I don't know exactly what it said, since I didn't read it. I think it was going to burn fat and build muscle and make my whatever bigger if I had one. In fact I am also a fitness professional and it is on my resume, but I wonder what kind of software can put all that together to spam? I just forwarded it to my isp, but may... See more My email is not in my resume, although I am set to accept emails through ProZ. I recently got an email through ProZ saying since I am a fitness professional blah blah blah. I don't know exactly what it said, since I didn't read it. I think it was going to burn fat and build muscle and make my whatever bigger if I had one. In fact I am also a fitness professional and it is on my resume, but I wonder what kind of software can put all that together to spam? I just forwarded it to my isp, but maybe I should have contacted the site moderators as well. ▲ Collapse
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