vacation-disaster scam
Mon Nov 3 10:28:37 EST 2014
This is a fairly common scam, but it's success is based on my recognizing the sender as family (a relative, or close friend) and feeling compelled to help - perhaps without doing any checking, e.g. confirming that my friend is actually travelling, away from home, outside the country. So it requires hacking a real email account to get access to (a) the email's point of origin and (b) the intial victim's collection of email addresses. The last time I got one of these my friend was, of course, not on vacation, not out of town; at work, normal schedule. The message was extremely similar to this (including this missing space after "cash,"), but the location was Manila.
How might the "bad guys" hack your email?
In this case I don't recognize the sender's name. I don't know why I would be in her address book.Return-Path: hbouchierh@aol.com
From: "Heather Bouchier Hayes"
Subject: Help.......Heather Hayes
To: #########@comcast.net
Reply-To: Hbouchlerh@aol.com
Disposition-Notification-To: "Heather Bouchier Hayes"
Date: Mon, 3 Nov 2014 08:16:40 +0100
I'm writing this with tears in my eyes, my family and I came down here to Kiev, Ukraine for a short vacation,unfortunately we were mugged at the park of the hotel where we stayed all cash,credit card and mobile phone were stolen off us but luckily we still have our passports with us.
We've been to the Embassy and the Police here but they're not helping issues at all the bad news is our flight will be leaving in less than 8-hrs from now but we're having problems settling the hotel bills and the hotel manager won't let us leave until we settle the bills.
I'll need your help (LOAN) financially of £32,300. I promise to make the refund once we get back home. Please let me know if i can count on you and i need you to keep checking your email because it's the only way i can reach you.
Heather Bouchier Hayes
---
This email is free from viruses and malware because avast! Antivirus protection is active.
http://www.avast.com
I don't know what kind of circles Heather travels in, but I don't know anyone I could ask for £32,300 ($51,592.79, at today's exchange rate (1.59730)). If I needed that much money, I wouldn't be trying to get it all from one person; I would be asking (many) people to contribute what they could.
And in the there's-always-something-in-spam-that-doesn't-make-sense category:
[This entry was originally posted as https://syntonic-comma.dreamwidth.org/707432.html on Dreamwidth (where there are
comments).]
This is a fairly common scam, but it's success is based on my recognizing the sender as family (a relative, or close friend) and feeling compelled to help - perhaps without doing any checking, e.g. confirming that my friend is actually travelling, away from home, outside the country. So it requires hacking a real email account to get access to (a) the email's point of origin and (b) the intial victim's collection of email addresses. The last time I got one of these my friend was, of course, not on vacation, not out of town; at work, normal schedule. The message was extremely similar to this (including this missing space after "cash,"), but the location was Manila.
How might the "bad guys" hack your email?
- same password on your email account as on another account at a compromised website
- weak password that can be guessed
- obvious/guessable answers to a password-reset/rescue system
- virus on your computer that monitors keystrokes
In this case I don't recognize the sender's name. I don't know why I would be in her address book.Return-Path: hbouchierh@aol.com
From: "Heather Bouchier Hayes"
Subject: Help.......Heather Hayes
To: #########@comcast.net
Reply-To: Hbouchlerh@aol.com
Disposition-Notification-To: "Heather Bouchier Hayes"
Date: Mon, 3 Nov 2014 08:16:40 +0100
I'm writing this with tears in my eyes, my family and I came down here to Kiev, Ukraine for a short vacation,unfortunately we were mugged at the park of the hotel where we stayed all cash,credit card and mobile phone were stolen off us but luckily we still have our passports with us.
We've been to the Embassy and the Police here but they're not helping issues at all the bad news is our flight will be leaving in less than 8-hrs from now but we're having problems settling the hotel bills and the hotel manager won't let us leave until we settle the bills.
I'll need your help (LOAN) financially of £32,300. I promise to make the refund once we get back home. Please let me know if i can count on you and i need you to keep checking your email because it's the only way i can reach you.
Heather Bouchier Hayes
---
This email is free from viruses and malware because avast! Antivirus protection is active.
http://www.avast.com
I don't know what kind of circles Heather travels in, but I don't know anyone I could ask for £32,300 ($51,592.79, at today's exchange rate (1.59730)). If I needed that much money, I wouldn't be trying to get it all from one person; I would be asking (many) people to contribute what they could.
And in the there's-always-something-in-spam-that-doesn't-make-sense category:
- Don't hotels collect your credit-card details when you register? You should be able to settle up without the physical card.
- Who would be vacationing in Ukraine now, with Separatists and Russian troops about?
[This entry was originally posted as https://syntonic-comma.dreamwidth.org/707432.html on Dreamwidth (where there are
comments).]