Obnoxious spam

[spot]

This, it strikes me, is more despicable than even the average "you have won the lottery". This is really foul.

Christian Aid®

35 Lower Marsh

Waterloo London

SE1 7RL.



Dear Sir/Madam,

This is to notify you that you have been chosen by

The Board of Trustees of the Christian Aid (NGO UK) as One of the final Recipients of a Cash Grant/Donation Economic growth and a poverty alleviation scheme.

Christian Aid (U.K.) a Multi-Million Pounds NGO group was Established with the objective Of Human Growth, Educational and Community development.

In line with the 61st anniversary program, the

Christian Aid (U.K.) in conjunction with the European Council is giving out Eight Million Five Hundred Thousand Pounds Sterling as specific Donations/Grants to

10 lucky International recipients worldwide in different Categories for Business development and Social.

These funds are freely given to use for your business And educational development, charitable work and your Community development at large.

Your Email was selected Based on an internet random Selection exercise,you therefore are confirmed one of The lucky recipients and are entitled To GBP850,000 (EIGHT HUNDRED AND FIFTY THOUSAND POUNDS STERLING ) as charity donations/aid from the Christian Aid (UK).

You are required to Contact immediately the Christian Aid(UK) Secretary below:for Qualification documentations,

verification and Processing of your GBP850,000 entitlement.

Endeavour to quote your Qualification Number: (CAID 20 N10a)

Dr. David Anderson

Christian Aid (UK)

TEL/Fax:

Email:

With the following information;

Claims Requirements:

1.Name in full----------------------------------------------

2.Address---------------------------------------------------

3.Nationality-----------------------------------------------

4.Age-------------------------------------------------------

5.Occupation------------------------------------------------

6.Phone/Fax-------------------------------------------------

7.Present Country-------------------------------------------

8. Alternate Email Address----------------------------------

Please note that these donations/Grants are

Administered by a UK Bank and therefore subject to UK Banking Laws. You are by all means advised,

To keep this whole information confidential until you Have collected your grant, this is to avoid double And unqualified claim, due to beneficiaries informing Third parties on cash grant donation.

On behalf of the Board, kindly accept our warmest

Congratulations!

Yours faithfully,

Daleep Mukharji

Christian Aid Director.

[G#Gill]

I take it you checked this out thoroughly, so what was the outcome?

[spot]

Checked in what sense, Gill? It was in my Inbox this morning. It's nastier than most, that's all.

Here, this is the same chap...From: “MRC- College of Experts”

Reply-To: [email]

Subject: [Spam] Medical Research Council – College of Experts

Date: Sun, 22 Mar 2009 07:37:48 -0700

To: xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Hello,

My name is MR.Cesar Augusto Mendoza, Personal Assistant to Prof. Anthony

Brayton, Researcher of HIV Immunology. My Boss and his

fellow collaborators have been researching into possible

ways to create Immunity to the HIV Virus, so far his

research has made significant contributions to our

understanding of immunity to infection, inflammation and to

fundamental Immunology with the result that He has been

elected to serve as a member of the MRC – College of Experts

(2005-2009).

We have donors who have been making generous donations to

the Institute for the development of this research. Due to

intensive research work,lack of available time and different

forms of donations, from our American and European donors,

we hereby need a collector in your country who would act as

a representative, collecting payments on our behalf.

Job Specifics:

1. Collection of Donations / Payments

2. Cashing of Donations / Payments

3. Deduction of commission 10% per donation/payment received

4. Sending cashed donation/payments to the institute

following Our Instruction.

5. Keeping Record of each donation / payment received and sent.

Note that your commission for being our representative is

10% per payment received and cashed. If you are interested

in working with us, reply to specifically to: (with the following. details:

Full Names: Address:

City:

State:

Zipcode:

Country:

Age:

Present Occupation:

Telephone(s):

After two months of working with us, you would be invited

on our own expense paid trip to our Institute to see the

progress of our Research.

Yours Faithfully.

MR.Cesar Augusto Mendoza

[G#Gill]

I wonder why they picked your email address? You know there will be many people who will fall for these kind of emails, and yes they are obnoxious.

As they seem so legitimate, how can one check that they are genuine? All I do is just delete them, if I do not recognise the sender, without opening them. E-mail scams have taken over from the snail mail scams. At least when we got snail mail scams, we just returned them to the sender with no stamp on ! Can't do that on the internet !

[Nomad]

Somebody somewhere must be falling for it or they wouldnt keep doing it. Still Id rather see spam than spam police or internet watch dogs regulating commerce, blogs, porn whatever.

[G#Gill]

You wait Nomie! What's the betting that email charges will be introduced, the money to go to a central (worldwide) establishment, to fund spam/scam police, in order to generate some sort of control on these unsolicited emails. At the moment emailing is free, but you can bet your boots that in time somebody will think of a way of charging for them. The income to go to the country where the email was sent from! When you think about it, there must be millions of dollars, euros, pound sterling, etc, to be grabbed from the billions of emails that are sent every day!

[Nomad]

G#Gill;1288480 wrote: You wait Nomie! What's the betting that email charges will be introduced, the money to go to a central (worldwide) establishment, to fund spam/scam police, in order to generate some sort of control on these unsolicited emails. At the moment emailing is free, but you can bet your boots that in time somebody will think of a way of charging for them. The income to go to the country where the email was sent from! When you think about it, there must be millions of dollars, euros, pound sterling, etc, to be grabbed from the billions of emails that are sent every day!


Oh Im quite certain the gears are turning. So far as I know only the really repressed cultures are getting away with it but if they tried introducing legislation here or there, there would be hell to pay.

[G#Gill]

Nomad;1288482 wrote: Oh Im quite certain the gears are turning. So far as I know only the really repressed cultures are getting away with it but if they tried introducing legislation here or there, there would be hell to pay.


There certainly would! But if it was brought in, what the hell can anybody do about it?

[spot]

Change their ISP, presumably. Governments charge for lots of things but I guarantee email's never going to be one of them. I get over 5000 a day that I've not asked for, I'm not responsible for their arriving and I can do nothing to stop them. Charging me makes no sense at all. Besides, they form a completely insignificant proportion of the traffic volume over the Internet. Music downloads, now that's a different matter altogether.

[abbey]

Warning: fraudulent emails - Christian Aid

[BTS]

Ya gonna share that GBP850,000 (1,332,647 USD) with the Gardeners???:-3:-3;);)

[spot]

The very day it arrives, equal shares all round for whoever's posted that week.

[Richard Bell]

spot;1288468 wrote:

Here, this is the same chap...From: “MRC- College of Experts”

Reply-To: [email]

Subject: [Spam] Medical Research Council – College of Experts

Date: Sun, 22 Mar 2009 07:37:48 -0700

To: xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Hello,

My name is MR.Cesar Augusto Mendoza, Personal Assistant to Prof. Anthony

Brayton, Researcher of HIV Immunology. My Boss and his

fellow collaborators have been researching into possible

ways to create Immunity to the HIV Virus




"HIV Virus"?

As if "College Of Experts" wasn't stupid enough!

As scammers, they're quite pathetic.

[spot]

Here we are. How to pollute product reviews. I wonder what they're really up to. Money laundering, I expect.


Hello, I am an Amazon seller. I wonder if you do Amazon reviews?
These are new items for amazon review, we do refund after review via paypal, shipping fee and tax will be covered, would you like to have a try?
Below are my hot products sample, and attachment are my all product list.
You can choose one or two products to free.
Look forward to your reply！

[LarsMac]

I occasionally wander through my spam folder to see what has made its way there, but that's a new one.
I get nearly nothing of such a nature in my actual inbox, these days. Google and Microsoft email servers are actually pretty efficient at filtering out most of the garbage.

[cars]

I hate the spam phone calls (over and over) that tell me my car's warranty is about to expire, so call this number immediately to renew it!!

My car's warranty expired a few years ago!!! SOB's!

[LarsMac]

My phone has a setting that lets Google screen calls for me. The phone asks the caller what they want to speak with me about, and records their message.
I almost never have to listen to those calls.
I love technology.

[cars]

My phone has a setting that lets Google screen calls for me. The phone asks the caller what they want to speak with me about, and records their message.
I almost never have to listen to those calls.
I love technology.

Is that a cell phone you're talking about? I'm talking about a land line phone, (no apps) my wife hates cell phones. I'd be interested if land line!

[LarsMac]

My phone has a setting that lets Google screen calls for me. The phone asks the caller what they want to speak with me about, and records their message.
I almost never have to listen to those calls.
I love technology.

Is that a cell phone you're talking about? I'm talking about a land line phone, (no apps) my wife hates cell phones. I'd be interested if land line!

I've not had a land line in so long I wasn't sure they still have them.
I kept one for a while because I needed it for FAXing documents. Bu that was a decade or two back.

[FourPart]

The 2 biggest giveaways of a scam are, firstly, that the amount supposedly being offered is ridiculously high.
Second is that they always include "GBP" as Currency.

[FourPart]

You should watch Kitboga's videos. He hacks into Scammer's systems & really gets them wound up. Absolutely hilarious.

[LarsMac]

I never bother with a number I don't recognize. They can leave a message.
And my spam filter is really good with email.
I almost miss getting spam.

[spot]

I just had a nasty little email, it starts

Dear Customer

We are writing to let you know that your HMRC Self Assessment password is about to expire.

[..]

You need to complete this process within 48 hours to avoid account inactive.

That's very unpleasant.

[LarsMac]

so, what's an "HMRC Self assessment"?

[spot]

so, what's an "HMRC Self assessment"?

His Majesty's Revenue and Customs.

Each year we get to send a statement of income and expenses to the Government, accompanied by appropriate income tax on the net proceeds. The Government runs a website for those who prefer an online experience. The scam email wanted my credentials in order to change my password and contact details. They then make a false claim for immediate refunds on previous years into their own hijacked UK bank accounts, which they would then siphon out of the country. It can be a startlingly expensive scam to fall for.

[LarsMac]

Ouch

I am often curious to know the percentages of people who fall for that kind of thing.