Please do not mistake this as a spam, your winning is real

So, I don't post these as often as I used to, but I thought this was worth a good chuckle.  I'll let you know if I get any response.

ATM MasterCard Department.

Attn: Beneficiary,

I write to you concerning the international email bullock drawn winning which Zenith Bank Plc do every 4years.This year 2014, your email happen to be one of the luckiest email which came out as a winning from the drawn and the Panel Zenith Bank Plc, has approved to send your winning through an International Swift (ATM MasterCard) valid sum of $2,500.000.00. (Two Million, Five hundred Thousand United State Dollars) Which is access able in any ATM Machine location Worldwide.

Your winning payment has today been approved by the federal ministry of finance with authority to remit your payment ATM MasterCard. Please know that your winning ATM MasterCard has been handed over to zenith Bank Admin director, Mr Anthony Morrison. All useful papers with Proof of Ownership Certificate will be attached to you as the possible beneficiary of the said fund before shipment. Also letting you know that a concrete shipping arrangement has been setup with Fedex courier service to receive your ATM MasterCard in the next 48Hrs for pick up.But you will have to secure the shipping papers and insurance permit order to execute an express deliver to you. Honestly It will cost you $280.00 and no further fee attached after that.

If you desire to receive your ATM MasterCard now and start usage to your funds, Than complete the bellow information accordingly and send to  (mr.anthonymorrison101@gmail.com) to start processing your shipment with immediate effect

(1) Your Full Name :

(2) Full Residential Address : (P.O.BOX NOT ALLOWED)

(3) Direct and Current Phone :

(4) Present Country :

Once your details is been submitted to Mr Anthony Morrison as instructed, Then all useful papers and guide lines will be given accordingly to secure your ATM shipment with the courier service and the tracking for pick up. Please do not mistake this as a spam, your winning is real.

Also, do not be difficult with the $280.00 required to obtain the shipping papers with the courier service. It is the only mince since you not located close to Zenith Bank head Quarter here for pick up in person.

congratulation in advance to receive your winning funds.

Thanks for your co-operation.

Tel-Number: +234-704-637-1100

...and now for my response!

Hello!

I am quite surprised by this email, and extremely overjoyed!  I mean, holy crap, you only do this drawing once every 4 years, and I was lucky enough to get picked? WOW! That's amazing!

I'm a little concerned though.  I mean... $2.5 million...on a single ATM card?

What happens if I lose it!?!?!?!?!

Can you split it into several ATM cards? Maybe 5? That way if I lose one I won't lose all of my money.

Also, I don't think I need a Proof of Ownership certificate. I'd also be ok with standard delivery instead of express.  So I've done some rough calculations, and I think that would only cost me about $150, right?  So is that ok? I'll send you $150 and you send me 5 ATM cards, no Proof of Ownership, and not Express? Also, why can't I use my Post Office box? Does the stuff have to be shipped FedEx? The last time I got something from FedEx, they mistook my neighbor's compost bin for a mailbox - and let me tell you that Grateful Dead CD I ordered from Amazon STILL stinks! So, if I could get it delivered to a post office box that would be great.

I tried calling you at 704-637-1100 but I got some law firm in North Carolina who had never heard of you.

Look forward to hearing from you!

Ken

419 Scammers Target Victims of 419 Scammers...

I got this email today.  Really made me chuckle...

Economic And Financial Crimes Commision
No.5, Bill Clinton Crescent, Off Adetokunbo Ademola
Wuse II, Abuja, Nigeria.


ECONOMIC & FINANCIAL CRIMES COMMISSION (EFCC).in collaboration with United Nation, (UN) and United State GOVERNMENT.


Attention: Beneficiary

SCAMMED VICTIM/ $2.5million COMPENSATION FUND-REF/PAYMENTS CODE: 06654.

We were delegated by Economic and Financial Crimes Commission [EFCC] Nigeria in conjunction with the United Nations to pay 200 Americans, Asia, Europe countries etc, In view of this recommendations, I want you to know that during the last UN and EFCC meetings held in Abuja Nigeria, it was alarmed so much by the rest of the world in the meetings on the loose of funds by various foreigners to the scams artists operating in syndicates all over the world today.

In other to retain the good image of this great country, the president (Goodluck Jonathan) has instructed the immediate compensation payment of $2.5million each, to each scam victim through Guarantee Trust Bank, which is the approved Bank that will be responsible for your compensation fund transfer and issuance of International certified bank draft via under funding assistance by the Central Bank of Nigeria.

85 scam victims who were scammed by scam artists/perpetrators has been paid sum $2.5million each so far, and you are listed and approved for this payments as one of the scammed victims.
Kindly contact EFCC foreign operating assistant commissioner Mr. Mike Johnson for your compensation fund release.

Email: edujlgs@ig.com.br
Phone: +2348037165537

Option 1: Fund through Bank Transfer,

1 Your bank name:
2. Bank address:
3. Your account number:
4. Routing number:
5. Swift code/IBAN:
6. Beneficiary name:
7. Phone/Mobile no:
8. Address:
9. Nationality
10. Gender
11. Occupation
12. Age
OPTION 2: to receive fund through International Certified Bank delivery, fill in the listed details below:

(1) Full name:
(2) Delivery address:
(3) Direct mobile/ phone /fax:
(4) Occupation
(5)Gender
(6) Nationality
(7) Age

You are hereby warned not to communicate or duplicate this message to anybody in email exchange for any reason or whatsoever, EFCC in support of the US secret service is already tracing tracking the criminals for your own good make sure you stop dealing with scammer and imposter, and also make sure you forward the daily scams letter you received to us be warned.

Yours faithfully,
Danson Bowell, DE-factor Chief Compensation Officer

Dissecting a World of Warcraft Phishing Attack

I recently recieved the following email attempting to obtain my Battle.net login information. This email is of course designed to steal credentials for World of Warcraft.

from:		Blizzard Entertainment kang111329@gmail.com
to:		<removed>@gmail.com
date:		Thu, Jan 16, 2014 at 4:46 AM
subject:		Blizzard Entertainment - Account Investigation Notification
mailed-by:		gmail.com
signed-by:		gmail.com

Violates our policies for Battle.net
Dear customer,
Because you are involved in the trading of gold and equipment, legitimately means playing with an unaltered game client. Doing otherwise violates our policies for Battle.net, and it goes against the spirit of fair play that all of our games are based on. We strongly recommend that you avoid using any hacks, cheats, bots, or exploits. Suspensions and bans of players that have used or start using cheats and hacks.
You can confirm that you are the original owner of the account to this secure website with:
http://www.blizzardmory.com/login/login.aspx?ref=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.worldofwarcraft.com%2Faccount%2F&app=wamLogin to your account, In accordance following template to verify your account.
* Account Name and Password
* Secret Question and Answer
Show * Please enter the correct information
If you ignore this mail your account can and will be closed permanently.
If you wish to review our current Rules and Policies for World of Warcraft and Battle.net, they can be found at:
http://www.blizzardmory.com/login/login.aspx?ref=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.worldofwarcraft.com%2Faccount%2F&app=wamFor further security tips, please visit:
http://www.blizzardmory.comRegards,
Customer Services
Account Administration Team

Blizzard Entertainment 

Let's take a look at the email in depth and analyze where this phish is coming from.

The scammers just keep getting dumber...

Got this email today:

Good Day Dearest One Dear !! I am Madam.Sonia Zuru I am a widow being that I lost my husband,my husband was a serving director of the Cocoa exporting board until his death.He was assassinated by the rebels following the political uprising, before his death he made a deposit of Six Million Five Hundred Dollars ($ 6,500,000.00) here in Ouagadougou Burkina Faso in one of the Security Company,he intended to buy a Cocoa processing Machine with the fund.I want you to help me for us to retrieve this fund and transfer it to your account in your country or any safer place as you will be the beneficiary and recipient of the fund which we will use for joint investment in your country.I have plans to do investment in your country, like real estate and industrial production.This is my reason for writing to you. Please if you are willing to assist me and my only Daughter Linda Zuru, Telephone REMOVED Thanks and best regards . Madam Sonia Zuru

I've never priced a cocoa processing machine, but something tells me over $6 million is a little excessive. I'm also kinda disappointed. $6.5 million is pocket change compared to the scams I used to receive. I know the economy is tough right now, but it's not like these scammers are actually offering real money. Add a few more zeros to that and you might perk my interest.

Surely this is a legit lottery email and not a scam...

This email just showed up in my inbox...

Subject: .YOUR EM,AIL HAS WON,N
Date: Wed, 18 Apr 2012 20:55:19 +0200
It has finally come to our notice that you have not claimed your winning price. We want to verify if truly you are the owner of the email address that has won the 2012 Microsoft Email lottery draw. Because we have sent the winning notification to your address but you did not write back.

If you are the owner of the email address that has won the Email lottery, we advice you claim your winning price as quick as possible to avoid losing it, as the lottery program might come to an end within the next seven days or next week.

Best Regards.

Dr. Clinton W. E. Bateman (Coordinator M.S. Lotto)
Tel: +44-703-184-1863 +441212880874
EMAIL: infomsloto@mslot-agent.info.ms

Surely this is a legitimate email, right?

Woman Gives Birth to Three Plates

Just saw this email in the "funsec" mailing list:

Hello,

My name is Mrs Yetunde Owolabi from Republic of Benin, I gave birth to three plates, 3 children at a time after the death my husband on 18th of June 2011 by auto car
accident. Already we have received 5 children from God, right now I can't take care of them so I have decided to give them out for adoption, if you are interested let me know, I am not selling them but you will only pay for adoption fees to the ministry in concern and the Lawyer will legalized all the relevant documents and the baby will become legally yours.

Thanks,

Mrs. Yetunde Owolabi

You read that right.  She gave birth to 3 plates.

I really wish I had her email address, as I would be very impressed if she could provide some pictures of these plates.

The Lottery Scam - Jeani's Story

Advance Fee Fraud scams don't always come through email.  This is a true story from a friend.

During the holiday season in 2008, Jeani received notification that she had won a lottery in Russia.  This notification was through postal mail, and included a $6,000 check.

The scam offered Jeani $25,000 in exchange for her cashing the $6,000 check and returning the money via Western Union within 24 hours.

Luckily Jeani suspected this was a scam.  Continue on to read the rest of her story...

A look at the various advance fee fraud methods...

As part of my continuing "To Catch a Scammer" project, I've decided to begin analyzing various advance fee frauds.

Covered in this post:
Lottery/Contest Scam
Money Laundering Scam
Inheritance Donation Scam

Research Project: To Catch a Scammer

My first featured research project on this site will be "To Catch a Scammer".  I'm sure you've heard of NBC's To Catch a Predator.

The idea behind this research project is to examine internet scams and frauds, such as Advance Fee Fraud aka Nigerian 419 scam, auction scams, stock scams, etc.

I am currently researching the techniques used by Advance Fee Fraud scammers.

Surely this will be filled with fun.  I'm already conversing with one of the scammers, and will be uploading some rather interesting findings soon.