I've almost been scammed...
 

Yesterday I've received a message from someone who claimed that he's a representative of MICROSOFT.COM telling me that I have won a lottery worthy of 1000,000 EURO( yeah, right). I almost thought to myself that a world of dream is opening in front of me, but then I made some research and I even contacted Mike( since most of his business is invovling computers and e-mails). He warned me that this might be a scam....and after I read some stories about people who had the same damn incident, I can say that Mike is absolutely right. I HAVE ALMOST BEEN SCAMMED. A common guy such as I been scammed. I don't even have a $1000 in my bank, and you want me to believe that a million Euro is going to be transfered TO ME just because my email is one of the first fifty e-mails out of 20,000,000 e-mails?
:035:

Dude..I get at least 2 emails a month from some nigerian banker telling me I'm the sole heir to millions..All they need is my name and BANK ACCOUNT NUMBER to send me the money :005:

steve

man it would have been badd if it happened! im glad it didn't :D

Yep, I get at least one of those a week. Strange how I won the lottery without even entering or registering my email somewhere isnt it. Then theres the bogus ebay emails asking me to update my details by logging onto a fake site, or the same with fake paypal sites etc. best tip: mouse over the link in any emails and if its gibberish before/after the address= fake= delete straight away.

I get a lot of those Nigerian bank scams too. As well as ebay, paypal, and various bank messages saying I need to update the account. Good rule of thumb is to NOT click the link to the site, but to type the real site's address in the address bar and log in that way. Some scammers make replicas of legitimate sites to capture your login data - the telltale sign is the web address; it will be either a raw IP address, or a variation of the real site's domain by using a sub domain (like www . scammer . ebay . com). I wonder how many non-savvy people get conned into entering sensitive data from emails?

My thoughts exactly. I nearly got caught out many moons ago, but when they asked for my NI number I realised it was a fake site and that the real one didnt ask for such sensitive info. Thankfully IE 8 o whatever the latest one is detects 99% of the spoof emails, but a few still go unflagged- check those IP/ web addresses carefully people.

The trouble is, many people don't know what to look for when they look at the IP/web addresses...

Oh well, it would have been really nice if I won a million Euro just like that.

That's how they get you - they appeal to the human nature of wanting to get something for nothing. It's even worse when there's a sob-story attached, or add in a smattering of religious dogma.

If the scam is going to a site to capture log in details, you can enter the actual IP/web address into a whois search and find out who owns the domain. Chances are it's an off-shore place where you can't touch them.

Sneaky SOBs...

Yea, no kidding. Good thing you checked though...

another way to check the authenticity of a site - when it asks for your password to log in - type something stupid in - if it lets you in - then its not a true site - did this with Ebay - and if it is a bad site - report it to the correct and legitimate site...

I like to do that with the hoaxers who try to con me. I type in obscenities as my username & password, then enter a whole slue of insults for my other details that they're after.

This kinda stuff should be taught in schools; my IT lessons consisted of looking at porn sites and doing a spreadsheet for something to do with a dentist?! What do they teach kids these days?.....

I've done that too, but you shouldn't do it from the link in the email. Sometimes, your email addy is part of the link and then they know that it was a valid address...

Yeah, worth mentioning that. I copy and paste the link and do it that way- sometimes the link is dead though or you get an error message= shut down or moved location.... whatever, but the effort some people put into their scams is incredible; they might as well get a real job- less hassle & easier money....

If its too good to be true, than its a scam.

Best piece of advice! No kidding..:D

Definately. i like the ones I get from Amazon & united states centrel bank etc saying I have to update my details; I dont even have an account with any of them- makes me laugh, it really does.

I was almost scammed as well...I got a e-mail the other day from a "e-bay seller" that said I had expressed interest in a 1gb stick of RAM for my computer and that a buyer had backed out and I could get it...this happened right after I got the mail and got my RAM in...At that point I knew it was a scam, so I ignored it. The next day (yesterday) I got an e-mail from him saying he was in Italy for his sisters wedding and the item was ready to ship, I just had to give him my info...NOT GONNA HAPPEN. He even tried to assure me it was gonna go through e-bay and follow the e-bay policy and all. I knew it BS because he said he was in Italy...Nothing against Italians, but thats where alot of the scams come from, mainly because, if I was informed correctly, the US doesn't expedite criminals from Italy, so I couldn't do a damn thing about it. Now by this time I had said stop sending me e-mails trying to scam me 2 times, but today I get a second chance offer from e-bay. The e-mail looked legit, but I knew it was BS since when I clicked the link to the auction, it said: http://www.ebay.com:80/wsyadayada. Now the :80 was a dead give away for me, but some it might not be. Don't let this kinda thing happen to you guys. I can easily see how somebody would be fooled by this.

LOL. When I read "the US doesn't expedite criminals from Italy", I just had to laugh. I know you meant "extradite", but I can just imagine the US hurrying criminals from Italy. Sorry, it must just have been one of things that struck me funny.

BTW, the ":80" just means port 80, which is the http protocol. The emailer probably put that in there so any email program would know it's an http link. I would be very cautious of subdomains - something like www.ebay.scam_artist.com. The ebay part looks good, but is just a subdomain of "scam-artist.com". Or, you hover over a link, and only an IP address appears in the status bar. Or, a javascript pseudo link call. All of these methods are commonly used.

I dunno. You would just have to see the e-mail I guess. It makes no sense whatso ever since I didn't "bid" on it and lose the auction like the e-mail said. I used Buy It Now...And yes, I meant extradite...I haven't slept much lately...:025: I'll try and get a screenshot of the e-mail. It will give a good idea as to how BS it is.

Here is a screenshot of the e-mail.

Yeah, it looks good (can't see the actual link URLs), but it has to be bogus since you didn't bid on it or whatever. It's hard to trust anything in email these days. :sigh:

Besides that, if you get a second chance offer, and it says it in the e-mail, you get the same message on e-bay. I never got it...

Yeah, thats the best way of telling. If you get a message in your email inbox claiming to be from feebay or gaypal, check your ebay & paypal accounts too for the message; if its not there, then its a fake. I saw on the news the other night that scammers are increasingly evading spam filters by using pictures containing links & text- the spam filter doesnt spot them so they end up in your inbox. Crafty people these scammers but old internet hands like ourselves arent so easily fooled- newbies take heed.

Worrying development.... I just got an email claiming to be from paypal, asking me to update my details. Obviously a fake due to the total lack of effort in that they just wrote a text email, no paypal logos or anything, but the link to their spoof site is http://www.paypalgroups.com Now this, to the untrained eye looks seriously authentic compared to some spoof paypal site addresses.....