Got this email today: It had a sleazily disguised email address: remax@remax.com and Remax.com is a legit real estate website.
I am always getting the e-mails for the knob enlargement equipment, and I can tell you from experience, they don't even work!
There is a way to make an email look legit but that it goes to a different address. I forget how you look to see where an address actually goes, but this is a technique that is often used by hackers to steal World of Warcraft accounts by using what often looks like a legit Blizzard email address. The newest scam that I've been getting is when someone from India calls me and the first thing they say is that they are a Microsoft technician and that they are calling regarding my Windows not working correctly. Since I've never given Microsoft my cell phone number I seriously doubt they would be calling me about any problems. At first I used to tell them what kind of an idiot they are and how I hate scam artists... now I just hang up on them right away.
Yeah, I had that. They called me on my cell while I was at work, told me my computer was putting out errors messages. I wasn't even near my computer. I told them that and they asked if I had a laptop. I think this may be part of the group that hijacks your data and ransoms it off to you.
This gives me an opportunity to share that I went to college with a guy who was the son of a former Somalian President. So apparently their targets are elderly people without computer knowledge and me.
Just float your cursor over the link (do not click the link) Then look in the lower left of your browser where it shows you exactly where that link goes. Obviously if the first part of the URL doesn't have the right website, don't click the link. Like in the example above www.writingforums.net would be something you shouldn't click on.
Fun fact: they're ridiculous by design. You can send a billion spam e-mails at the push of a button, but once someone responds, the rest of the scam takes effort and time. If someone clocks halfway through that strangers don't just give them $35million, all that effort is wasted. So the e-mail is designed to filter their prospects - 99.99% of people reject it as ridiculous, and only the most gullible will respond. That way, the scammers are only putting effort in for the people most likely to fall for it.
Yeah, I love it when Microsoft tells me I'm having trouble with my computer! I'm a Mac person and always have been, since 1994—and have only used Microsoft with a gun pointed at my head while I was at work. Most of the time I just hang up, but one time I told them that if there were problems with Microsoft, they might consider switching to Apple. That was fun. Long silence, then THEY hung up!
A couple of years back I had a message left on my mobile - it was someone with a very Nigerian sounding name (sorry for sounding prejudice, but not knowing any Nigerians ...) - and the guy claimed to be from my bank. Just sounded dubious to me. Very few people know my mobile so I ignored it. He rang a left another message and number a day later - when it happened that my local bank has phoned on my landline. I referred it to them - giving his name and number. They said it was a scam even though it was a genuine number of the bank (uh?). After he left a 3rd message, as it was a genuine number, I called back. I had bought money for a trip abroad and entered a draw and had won a voucher for a weekend away - all genuine. It's just the guy had a Nigerian name. So, perhaps not all Nigerian princes are bad guys.
My lad received a "Microsoft technician" call...so he just carried on playing "Call of Duty", occasionally talking to the techie, smooching him along that he was, in fact, following their instructions...it took them about half-an-hour to work out that they were being had!
