Best email

[PaulTRose]

i got tired of these, once replied to one to see if i could reverse scam him, started to get some emails from him wanting all sorts of personal details, kept it going for about a fortnight

told him my name was alan carr and i was a tv person, my address the american embassy in london, my banks address was bank of england (with a made up account number)......when he wanted a phone number so he could call me i did some googling, found the direct number for the head of the uk online fraud squad

dont know why but i didnt get any more emails from him after that

after that i did a bit of looking into baiting scammers......theres a great site called www.419eater.com thats fun to read

[Guest]

The ones I get are in very bad English. At first I thought no-one would be fooled by it but I read that the poor English could be deliberate. Any scammer wants to hook the medium-gullible or very gullible. He does not want to be loaded with replies from worldly-wise people who would certainly smell a rat as the scheme progressed and therefore waste his time. By repelling those at the very start, the scammer has a response rich in just the ones most likely to go the whole way. Clever! (Or perhaps too clever for them to dream up.)

[Guest]

The ones I get are in very bad English. At first I thought no-one would be fooled by it but I read that the poor English could be deliberate. Any scammer wants to hook the medium-gullible or very gullible. He does not want to be loaded with replies from worldly-wise people who would certainly smell a rat as the scheme progressed and therefore waste his time. By repelling those at the very start, the scammer has a response rich in just the ones most likely to go the whole way. Clever! (Or perhaps too clever for them to dream up.)

And if english was not your first language, then the confusing babble of legal sounding terms and conditions might seem more credible.

That is a defense we english speakers have; we can smell a fake through bad grammar and spelling.

[Guest]

you mean................................these are fake emails,oh my,thought it was just the utility companys ripping all the money outta my acc lol

mobear

[eddiesolo]

you mean................................these are fake emails,oh my,thought it was just the utility companys ripping all the money outta my acc lolmobear

No, you are correct in that the utilities are ripping you off Ole.

Si

[stona]

I've had several recently purporting to be from the Nat West regarding my account. The usual stuff, need my log on details due to computer problem....blah......blah.

It's not just that surely everybody knows that your bank would never contact you in this way, and they would usually use at least grammatically passable English. It's that I don't have an account with that bank, nor have I ever banked with them

Remember campers that if you reveal, even inadvertently, your security details to someone else and then get your account cleaned out the bank may well decide that it's your fault and try and squirm out of any liability.

Cheers

Steve

[Guest]

If you get ANY random email from a bank, even if it's yours.... Delete it.

If the bank HAS got a problem with your account then they will phone or send a letter. (or if you can't wait for that and it's worrying you, then phone or visit them!)

NEVER click a link to go to sign into your bank, ALWAYS go the banks main site and log in from there.

Never give any details online, your name, address, date of birth and telephone number are enough to set up a false I'd for someone.

[flyjoe180]

I get at least one of those bank details emails a week usually from banks I don't hold accounts with. All the advice above is good practice, and if like here you have a spam/phishing/online fraud department within one of your government departments (yes I know they too aren't exactly angels), forward the details to them to review and deal with as they see fit. If online scams aren't reported they will continue to be sent out and someone somewhere will fall into the trap.