A World Without Internet Scammers

 They have no capacity for shame. They will never stop. They will never find an honest way to make a living. They will say anything, do anything, and act anything to get their mark to buy the story. I speak of that wretched hive of scum and villainy (no, not Mos Eisley) otherwise known to the world as homo sapiens spammeritis irritatingus. The dirtbags who spend their time scamming and spamming our email accounts and blogs with nonsense such as the following, which turned up in my email some weeks ago.

Dear Email Owner,

This is to acknowledge the receipt of your message. World Bank Organization is eradicating COVID 19 lock down poverty in America,Asia,Europe,Oceania,Russia for the year 2023/2024 and your name was among the 10 Lucky people listed.Your ATM VISA CARD of ($10.5M USD) was registered with TNT Express Delivery. You will receive it within 48 hours.Your ATM VISA CARD compensation fund will be handed over to you in person at the address you will provide to us. Note,that the CARD compensation fund must get to your address within 48 hours once you reconfirm your receiving address as demanded below;

CONFIRM YOUR DELIVERY ADDRESS BELOW AND LET US KNOW IF THERE IS ANY CHANGE:

RECEIVER'S NAME:_____
DELIVERY ADDRESS:_____
DIRECT CELL NUMBER:___
COUNTRY:_______
OCCUPATION:____
E-MAIL (1):_____
E-MAIL (2):_____
SEX:____
WORKING ID:____

Ask him how you can get your CARD compensation fund of (US$10.500,000.00.)

TNT Company Office
Contact Person: Mr.Jessy Ezeh
E-mail: tnt.office@aol.com

Okay then. Unlike my last scammer who had the audacity to address me as dear, this numbskull uses the term "dear email owner". It uses the World Bank Organization (actually, it's just the World Bank, dumbass, but let's not confuse you any more than you already are) as its cover story and invokes Covid-19 reduction.... but then says I'm one of ten lucky bastards chosen to have 10.5 million dollars. In an ATM Visa card.

Oh, sure, that's legitimate. 

This scammer uses some of the tried and true techniques of the internet scammer- spacing and punctuation issues, capitalization issues (to say the least), and dangling a whole lot of money (that doesn't exist) from the World Bank, which doesn't give out money to random people.

Because that's not its function. It works at the national and international level.

But you're counting on one of the 500 000 random email addresses you sent this to to be owned by a dumbass. Someone dumber than you. Someone who sees the figure 10.5 million dollars and can't see the proverbial spam forest for the trees. Someone with their scammer alarm turned right the hell off. Someone whose family has been breeding too close to the gene pool.

When will you learn? This crap doesn't work on me. I see right through you. No matter how many times you keep sending this nonsense my way, I'll respond in the way I'm accustomed to. By ridiculing you. Without end. Until you finally take a hint and stop breathing.

A world without internet scammers. It would be a wonderful world, but unfortunately we don't live in that world. We live in this one. Oh well. 

Perhaps you should try scamming someone higher up the organized crime world than you. And see what they do in response. 

The Unreliable Sweden Scammer

 

They are a plague upon the universe. A pestilence that proves to be more irritating and everlasting than the plagues of Egypt. I speak of course of the vile lot we refer to as homo sapiens spammeritis annoyingus. That repugnant subspecies of human that can only make a living with endless spam and scams, sent in random emails and random comments on our posts and other places across the web. How did these people operate before the internet? Random phone calls? And before that, random telegrams? And before that, random mail?

They never take a hint and just go away. No, they persist in their nonsense. Such as the following, which found its way into my email a few days back.

Attention Box Beneficiary,

The Swedish Maritime Administration (Swedish:Sjцfartsverket)/Task Force wishes to notify you that we have busted and impounded an American ship for illegal maritime practices, the incident took place here at the Swedish maritime administration border with russia.

On board we have discovered over 10,000 consignment boxes among which two were found to carry your name as it aim to be deliver to the Ukrainian government to aid their Russian war, please kindly Authenticate yourself with a copy of passport, Drivers license and utility bill, also your phone and home address so we can direct you on the requirement for clearance and  delivery.

Regards,
Magnus Anderson
Marine Pilot & Managing director
Anderson Maritime Consulting AB

Well then, where to begin? For starters, the responding email was not listed to one Magnus Anderson, which of course is a huge red flag where these things are concerned. It's just the first in a long line of emails addresses leading back to the semi-literate spammer who sent this. 

There is a Magnus Anderson, and an Anderson Maritime Consulting in Sweden. You wonder how he feels about having his name co-opted in a scam email. Because that's precisely what this is. There are some of the usual tell-tales. The email that's overly formal but doesn't read as if it's written by someone with a command of the English language. Punctuation, capitalization of the wrong words.... the usual hallmarks.

And from a glance at the real Magnus Anderson's bona fides, Swedish or not, that guy would be fluent in English. He'd know well enough how to write an email that doesn't set off scammer alarm bells. But then he wouldn't be sending an email like this. Because he's too damned busy to be sending random emails to people.

No, this scammer hiding behind his name tells us a story about how the Swedes have impounded an American ship for "illegal maritime practices", and how among 10 000 consignment boxes there are a couple of them with my name on them. This is made more complicated by the suggestion that they were bound for the Ukraine to help in the war against Russia (see, scammer? It's not that hard to capitalize a country name).

This is fascinating to me. Because when I read that these were bound for the Ukraine to help in their war against the Russkies, I'm thinking weapons. And that baffles me, because I wasn't aware that I'm an arms dealer. But according to this scammer, two of those boxes came from me.

First it's a line of bull. There are no ten thousand boxes, there's just a story that's going to inevitably wind up in this scammer hoping I'll send a few thousand dollars along as a processing fee to allow these totally non-existent arms to be sent forward.

And second, while they're not trotting out money, they are now resorting to a different aspect of the internet scammer modus operandi: using the Ukraine-Russian war as their source material.

Now I'll cheerfully admit I'm on the side of the Ukraine in this whole thing. That petty little man in the Kremlin (emphasis on little), bent on getting even with the world, insists on making things worse for himself by carrying on a war that's not gone his way from the start. What that petty little man deserves is two rounds in the back of the head courtesy of anyone in his country with nothing to lose and an opportunity. but that's beside the point.

Because handing over copies of your passport, license, utility bills, etc. to a complete stranger online is a way to put yourself on the fast track to identity theft, loss of your savings, and things even less pleasant. And that's what would happen.

Nice try. Really, points for creativity. Plus let's face it, this is just the beginning. Soon we'll see the  emails coming from Cancer Widow of a former minister/ politician/ general of either side of the Ukraine conflict, flooding our junk email. Because that's what spammers do- take a real tragedy and try to exploit it. Assuming they can find someone gullible enough among the half million random email addresses they send such things to who'll actually believe the con.

In an ideal world, whoever you really are (because you're not Magnus Anderson), you'd get what you'd have coming to you. An encounter with an angry Kraken.

But unfortunately Krakens are fictional.

Ghosts, Ghouls, And Goblins

 Hallowe'en is upon us, and as usual I have an image blog for the occasion.

Enjoy, and horde all of the trick or treat candy for yourself.