Don't Reply to Spam .:. grubbykid.com

Don't Reply to Spam

We get letters:

Crap I was a dumbass and responded to a spam email you guys have (featured) on your website. At first i was emailed to help this lady and she will give me some money. It sounded to good to be true. So after a couple days of exchanging info (My freaking phone number and address) I looked her up on yahoo and found this site with the same letter:

First, I must apologize if my mode of first contact is not acceptable to you and also solicit your confidence in this transaction; this is by virtue of its nature as being utterly private and top secret. Though I know that a transaction of this magnitude will make anyone apprehensive and worried

My Name is Sylvia Letana,I am the only dauther of late Mr. and Mrs Fred Nzinga...

What should I do now. And is this for sure not real? For some reason I still have hope that this is true and she needs help. But I really know its fake and I feel like a real dumbass. Well plz email me back.

We are not sure if this is spam itself, so we will go ahead and answer here.

There are three issues here, with the first item being most important, the second being something you should follow from now on, and the third being superfluous.

First, you are so screwed. Totally. Screwed.

It is amazing what you can get with a name, address, and phone number. We just hope that you did not send your Social Security number, or your Mother's Maiden name because if you did my friend, you have just became a statistic.

What you need to do is to alert your bank, credit card companies, utility, phone companies, and whatever other company you have an account with, that you think you are the victim of identity theft, and put a hold on everything. At the same time, ask if there have been any changes of address or charges on every account in the last 30 days. Each company should have some method of dealing with fraud, and for "locking" your account to change. Greg Storey just went through this, and there are many good tips which you should follow.

Do this now.

Second, you (and this goes for everyone else out there) should never, ever respond to messages from strangers who offer free or outlandish "opportunities." Ever. If you don't know them, don't respond - especially if there are attachments - which you aren't opening ever (right?). Your penis will never grow longer (or girthier), your website won't ever attract millions, that sweet lady in Africa isn't really in trouble, and no one ever is the executor of a large inheritance. Ever. Especially if your "long lost relative" is from Africa and you are Honkey McWhiterson - it just isn't true.

Trust us on this one.

Third, you now owe us a brand new computer for being so incredibly foolish to give out your personal information over email. While you are buying us that spanking new computer, why don't you just buy yourself one while you have your credit card out - which seems to be your natural state when on the internet. That way your system won't be 0wNed (w00t!) when you eventually open an attachment, or download some wallpaper or screensaver and have your Windows machine crash due to spyware. We know you will eventually throw it out anyway, so you should just short-circuit that waste of $1,000 and buy two Macs, and give us one in the beginning.

Think how much more efficient that will be.

This next sentence will sound harsh - it is, but so is life. You are lucky that you have a fully-functioning cervical cortex, because handing out personal information over email to some dude in Nigeria is perhaps the stupidest thing we have ever heard. We know it sounds like an "incredible opportunity" or that you want to help someone out in times of need, just don't do it. Seriously, Don't do it, period. In fact, you might have just received a penalty flag on that play; please put down your keyboard, and stay off the internet for 10 days. Sorry, those are the breaks.

So good luck with fixing your mistake - hopefully everything will work out in the end. Just keep track of your account, and don't respond to spam and click attachments.

We will be waiting for our computer - the 20 inch model will be fine.

Comments

rp says:

It's called Pfishing and you'd be amazed how many people get caught up by giving info out to the Fraudsters...most credit card fraud is perpetrated by foreign nationals, and the Nigerians have the PHD with that type of email scams.

Posted by: rp at July 18, 2005 3:14 PM #

Jw says:

Yes, it is inDEED incredible how many people get H00K3D by those things... Anyone that had at least ONE decent parent or watched at least 10 hours of childrens TV must have learned not to "take candy from strangers". They deserve to have the poison candy, I guess, or get taken away and tortured to death by some pervert.

Or the analogous spam-related consequence, I guess.

The idea that this in itself could be a spam is great. Something could be, in essence, crawling the web for particular words or phrases, then shooting off prescribed emails based on said text? That would be clever.

Anyhow, I have no sympathy for people who believe that an email will bring them free money.

Posted by: Jw at July 18, 2005 4:51 PM #

plemeljr says:

Yeah - phishing has gotten really good bad lately. If people who basically built the modern web can't tell the difference between regular mail and phising, I think we are all screwed.

I have always wondered if at some point commerce and the State will collude to vastly alter the internet (to its' detriment) in the name of "protecting users." I could envision moving from a more asynchronous distributed architecture which the internet operates now, to a "guard dog" version where every information packet would have to go through a government-sponsored server for authentication. Sort of TRUSTe Orwell-style. That is what bothers me most about spam and phishing: stupid people which spam traps are leading us down the path of authoritarian control methods because they need nannies to "protect" them.

As for the chance this letter could be some sort of new meta-spam - I don't know. I wonder if I've just become too cynical or just so untrustworthy of things on the internet when dealing with email; the barrier of entry to spam is just too low, and it wouldn't surprise me if spammers would eventually implement more sophisticated levels of spam.

Posted by: plemeljr at July 18, 2005 5:34 PM #

Jw says:

Though, if you think about it, the only "sophisticated" spam that could POSSIBLY work in a world in which people were savvy would be something that actually came out of your computer, reached around you, and stole your wallet. There are just three rules you need to follow to avoid ALL spam- past, present, and future:

1. Never link from an email to a website and put in ANY information. If you ordered something from amazon and they send you an email.. just go to amazon and login... don't go through an email link.

2. Don't give anyone you dont know personal information over the web ever.

3. If your friends are suddenly asking for your credit card information, you've either won the lottery without knowing it, or it's not really them. Either way, keep your 16 digits (+exp date and super secret 3-digit number that always rubs off the back of the card) to yourself.

And if you want to be even more secure... bounce and delete all spam... don't just let it sit in your bin.

But I guess you'd have to be a reasoning, logical person to disbelieve an unsolicited correspondence that promises free money for this to work.

Posted by: Jw at July 19, 2005 8:07 AM #

m3x says:

in the words of one napolean dynomite....friggin' IDIOT!!