iScams

A visitor by the name of Michael, posted the below mail from the eLoterie’ International in a comment to another post. The e-mail is signed by the name of Stewart Wallis from Wallis & Gallagher Consulting, a company name that up to this point has been impossible to find on the web.
Thanks Michael! My spam filters has evolved enough that I don’t get these anymore.

First, Michael’s very direct comment about the mail he got:

THIS IS MY REPLY TO THE SCAMMERS
The email below is what was sent to me, all number you requested are available. One question… why are there so many misspellings and miss use of proper English? Are you possibly trying to scam me? If so, I cant wait for the part when you tell me there are some sort of taxes I have to pay upfront or shipping, please please please lets get on with it. What did I win, when will I receive payment?

If you check in again Michael, don’t hesitate to post any followup mails from the scammers to your reply. They would of course be really stupid to reply to such a call-out, but intelligence is rarely one of these scammers’ strong sides. Thick headedness is though, so they might just as well try to convicne you that you have actually won something…

And so on to the actual sting email from the scammers sending out winning notifications regarding the eLoterie’ International:

eLoterie’ International 2007 ™
Rue S. J. Bemdenlaan 121
3220 Edegem, Belgium
REF. NUMBER: eLI/3072215/03/07
BATCH NUMBER: 04-82-BE10

ATTN: Sir/Madam,

RE: NOTIFICATION

We are pleased to inform you, about the release to our first international promotion program (eLoterie’ International), held on the 25th of January 2007. Organised, to promote and encourage international participation, in our international first high stake lottery program.

In the 1st series, which was drawn from a pool of €2,460,000.00 (Two Million Four Hundred and Sixty Thousand Euros), playing with five numbers 15-26-2-34-11. Your email address, attached to ticket number 351, won in the 4th category and was awarded €517, 200.00 (Five Hundred and Seventeen Thousand, Two Hundred Euros only) in cash.

Please be informed that all names entered in the lottery program have been selected randomly through a computer ballot system with millions of entrants sourced through our international department, in conjunction with world residential white pages, and humanitarian organisations, with the help of chambers of commerce of countries.

To file for your claims please contact the designated accredited agent(s) below:

Stewart Wallis
Wallis & Gallagher Consulting
London, England.
EMAIL: wallisgallagherconsulting@yahoo.co.uk

All winnings must be claimed not later than two (2) weeks of receiving this notice. After this date, winnings that remain unclaimed would be returned, and late entry penalty requirement must be met before entry claims might be considered.

All correspondence must be directed to our authorized agent(s). Should there be any change of address, or wrongly spelt name, make sure you contact your assigned agent as soon as possible.

Thank you.

Yours faithfully,

NOEMIE THIBAUT (Ms)
Promotions Manager
eLoterie’ International.

Again, a Yahoo! email address. When will Yahoo! make an attempt to clear out these users?

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Even if the below mail, is quite similar to the previously published Dayzers Lottery scam, it is also very different, and needs a post of it own. Thanks to Gita, who submitted it in a comment. The Dayzers Lottery does in fac exist, but they don’t have any free-for anyone e-mail ballots. They even have a waring about these types of scams published on their website at http://www.dayzers.nl/informatie/waarschuwing.jsp

Unfortunately, the warning is only published in Dutch, a language that most of the victims for this type of scam don’t understand.

In this case, the scammes have used the official name of the Netherland state lottery: The Netherlands Staatsloterij, the Dayzers lottery brand name, as well as the official looking name Sweepstakes International Lottery Promotion Program.

There is no doubt that the below email is a scam (the main tell-tale, again being that an official lottery with it’s own domain wouldn’t use an aim.com email address for it’s communication). If you received a similar one, don’t hesitate to call the Dayzers Lottery in The Netherlands, they speak excellent English, German and French, and can tell you that you, like many others have been exposed to a sting operation.

!!!!!!!THE NETHERLANDS STAATSLOTERIJ:
Dayzers Nederland:
Paleisstraat 5, 2514 JA,
The Hague, The Netherlands.
Website: www.dayzers.nl

Dear beneficiary,

Following the official publication of results of the e-mail electronic online Sweepstakes organized by The Netherlands Staatsloterij Corporation held on Monday, the 16th of April, 2007 in The Hague - The Netherlands, wherein your electronic e-mail address emerged as one of the fifty online winning emails in the 1st category, out of a total of 500,000 e-mail addresses that were entered for the E-mail Lottery Ballot and has therefore attracted a cash award of One Million Euro only. This is from a total cash prize of Fifty Million Euro only, shared amongst the fifty winners in this category. Your electronic e-mail address attached to our Lottery payment order, has the following details: (I) Ticket Number: DZRS/STLOTT/837-3845/2007: (ii) Lucky Numbers: 07, 25, 31, 49, 54, 66, 72: (iii) Batch Number: 11/621/2PDH /DZRS/NL/07: (iv) File Reference Number: DZRS/82283922/2007:. No tickets were sold.
We write to officially notify you of this award and advise you to contact our Claims Department immediately on receipt of this message for more information concerning your identity verification, processing and eventual payment of the above prize to you.

For your identity verification, please contact our Claims Department:
Tel; +31 64 191 2354 ; e-mail: dayzers07claim@aim.com; Contact Person : Dr. Jerome Coles - while quoting: (i). Your full name(s) and Nationality; (ii). Batch Number and (iii). Reference Number:

The payment authority of your prize - One Million Euro only - already paid and insured in your name with our Paying bank will be issued to effect immediate/swift transfer in the mode you will prefer and nominate, upon satisfactory report on your identity verification and validation recommendation by our Claims Department. E-mail addresses registered with false names are not eligible to claiming this prize.
The Staatsloterij Award is sponsored by a consortium of software promotion companies i.e. The Intel Group, Toshiba, Dell Computers and Microsoft Corporation to encourage the use of the internet and promote computer literacy worldwide. We are proud to say that over 20 Million Euro are won annually in more than 150 countries worldwide, as a result of our promotional programmes.
All winnings must be claimed not later than 10th of May, 2007. After this date, all unclaimed funds will be withdrawn and remember to quote your reference and batch numbers in all correspondences.

Once again on behalf of all our staff, Congratulations.

Yours faithfully,

Mrs. Brenda Wolfgang
Lottery Coordinator
Sweepstakes International Lottery Promotion Program.

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A new brand of the online lottery scam has opened. This time said to be based in Malaysia, and under the name of Asia Online International Lottery. It’s a scam for sure, and my faithful server-side spam filter has stamped it as spam, but let it through anyway. It’s a weird detail that these scammers has sent it out with a blind carbon copy to my address. A true givaway that this was not intended for me only. How many others got it?

From: wins_claims@yahoo.com.hk
To: wins_claims@yahoo.com.hk
Date: 2007-mar-31 10:38
Subject: *****SPAM***** Call For Claims

ASIA ONLINE NOTIFICATION DESK.
GOVERNMENT ACCREDITED LICENSED!!
ASIA ONLINE INTERNATIONAL LOTTERY
IS REGISTERED UNDER THE DATA PROTECTION ACT OF;
(Registration Z720633X).
(24hours)CUSTOMER SERVICE
WINNING NOTIFICATION:Registration Z720633X
WINNING NOTIFICATION LETTER

We happily announce That the draw (#966) of Asia Online Lottery Raffle Draw held on 31st March 2007. Your e-mail address attached to ticket number: 56475600545 188 which subsequently won you one of the Thunder Ball Prizes.

You have therefore been approved to claim a total sum of (One million two hundred thousand Dollars ) ($1,200,000) in will be released to you by any of our payment offices in Malaysia.
To file for your claim, please contact our fiduciary agent:

Claims Department
contact our fiduciary
Mr. Wong Vanfrant,
Tel:+60173564103
Email:wins_claims@yahoo.com.hk

VERIFICATION FORM
1.FULLNAME 2.E-MAIL ADDRESS 3.FULL ADDRESS 4.SEX 5.AGE
6.OCCUPATION 7.TEL 8.COUNTRY 9.AMOUNT WON 10.ID
INDICATE YOUR MODE OF PAYMENT:
**VIA COURIER DELIVERY……………………….
**VIA BANK WIRE TRANSFER……………………..

Good luck from me and members of Asia Online International Lottery
Mrs.Rita Tung Po
Online Co-ordinator
Asia Online International Lottery
Copyright ?1994-2007 The Asia National Lottery

Well. Even with a Hong-Kong Yahoo address they won’t be able to fool that many people with

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Some really smart people at the University of Illinois in Chicago have written an application that can keep conversations going with scammers of all kinds in order to make them use up all their free time in endless conversations without end.

The robot can even simulate different personalities to make the mail exchange more convincing.

Here’s a really great example between the spamalot robot personality Arthur and a scammer:
http://acm.cs.uic.edu/~lszyba1/arthur.html

Two presentations from MIT SpamConference 2007 last Friday:
(The sound is really bad but gets better after a minute or so).

1. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QZwqq3aweHI
2. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=plIK8tMKS1A

This is a really great idea! Well worth my personal Nobel Prize.

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SEC, the US Securities and Exchange Commission, is now trying to put an end to the stock scams by closing down trade in 35 so-called Penny Stocks. Forbes, Lisa Lerer doesn’t have high hopes on this putting an end to stock spams:

The federal government made headlines on Thursday by cracking down on dozens of penny stocks whose prices had been manipulated by mass e-mailers.

But while the Securities and Exchange Commission made a splash by unveiling “Operation Spamalot”, it is unlikely to end spam. In the face of increased enforcement, warnings and federal laws, spam is not only continuing, but flourishing. And there’s no reason to think the SEC will be able to do anything to stop it.

Read on at:
forbes.com/home/security/2007/03/08/sec-spam-stock-tech-security-cx_ll_0308spam.html

Added: Here is the SEC press release:
www.sec.gov/news/press/2007/2007-34.htm

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Stock scams have been a real pain during the passed years, but this one has a new angle. It looks like an internal memo that has been sent out to the wrong address by misstake. It didn’t make it quite through my server-side spam filters though, even if it didn’t gather enough spam points foor immediate deletion.

From: RRGI Consulting <Coverage@rrgi.prserv.net>
To: PreRelease [my primary e-mail address]
Date: 2007-mar-06 14:51
Subject: *****SPAM***** FW: RRGI press release schedule

The following is the schedule of releases thus far for RRGI for March-

Wednesday Mar. 7th: Announce corporate coverage initiated to 22 million investors.

Monday Mar. 12th: Announce Venturepoint Research report discussing contracts being signed by advertisers and the revenue generated from these contracts.

Monday Mar. 19th: Announce Private newsletter coverage. The Savvy Investor will feature the company in the March edition. The Savvy Investor is a well respected and followed outlet providing market information, financial analysis and major media tie-ins.

Monday March 26th: Announce March Edition Updates and Reiterate Spike TV series launch, new contracts and revenue projections.

This should get us started..I am sure there will be other information that will be added as well during this same period as well as after, such as new advertisers as deals are finalized.

Regards,
Steven

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Many thanks to Rashad Zeed Alali Aldaher who submitted this mail about the “Nordic SMS Lottery” allegedly sent by the Nordic Lottery payment Office, as a comment to the running thread about the very similar, and probably related Gotenborg SMS Lottery scam.

A few points worth mentioning:

1. There is no such organisation as the Nordic Lottery payment Office.
2. The phone number stated, +46- 704051742 is an unlisted prepaid mobile phone. the only reference that I can find to it is in the reports on similar lottery scams, reported on this site.
3. The only legal lotteries of this scale conducted  in Sweden are indeed run by the government gambling monopolies, but the tax is always deducted from any winnings in advance.

At least, it is very clear what the scammers are after in this case. However, it is not at all certain that they are really based in Sweden. The number could very well be forward connected to any number throughouth the world.

Kungsgatan 112
S-90187 Umea,
Sweden
Name: Interbank payment service
Foreign Remittance Department:

Dear Rashad Zeed Alali Aldaher

You are welcome to the Nordic Lottery Payment Office an affiliate of
the Nordic SMS Lottery. I am pleased to be at your service and you
have been officially cleared for payment by the Verifications Department
at the headquarters of the Nordic SMS Lottery.

The original copy of your winning certificate, together with a covering
document (Money Laundering protection and Letter of Affidavit for
Claims) stating that the money was obtained
legally through the Nordic SMS Lottery is ready and has been sent
to the tax agency for processing

With regards to you collecting your money, it would be required for you
to either come over to Sweden to collect your money in person, office hours is
between 10 am and 4 pm monday to friday and on saturday 10 am to 2 pm,
you are also advised that you should notify us of your arrival, so we
will send our staff to come pick you at the airport, secondly on
arrival, you are required to pay a tax fee to the Tax Agency that would issue a tax clearance to
us and also issue an approval for the money to be given
to you, the tax fee is 13,775 Swedish Krona, you are advised to come with that
amount so you will pay to the Tax agency.

But if you are not able to come over to Sweden, then I would advise that
you contact the Tax Agency and find a way of send the money to
the them for the approval to be issued and we will collect the
tax clearance, then we will either make a bank transfer
of the money to you or we will send a bank cheque to you through a
courier company ( DHL or UPS ), but you will notify us of the best way
you would prefer the money been sent to you.

I know you would have prefer that the tax fee be deducted from the
amount you won, but your prize is protected by a hardcover insurance
policy, which makes it impossible to deduct any amount from the money
before it has been remitted to you. This means that no charges can be
deducted from the prize and hence must be provided by you before your
prize is transferred to you, and secondly you are the only person that
is liable to receive the money and not until the approval is received
from the tax office, the money cannot be transferred or deducted.

This is in accordance with section 13(1) (n) of the national gambling
act as adopted in 1993 and amended on 3rd July 1996 by the
constitutional assembly. This is to protect winners and to avoid
misappropriation of funds
Also be reminded that the deadline for the claiming of winnings is
exactly two weeks after the receipt of this email. After this period,
your cash prize will be deemed to have been forfeited by you and will be
reused in the drawings of the next edition of the lottery.

I hope to hear from you soon.
Good luck and Congratulations once again.
Regards,
Mr. John Palsson
Head of Payment Office
+46- 704051742

Many thanks to Rashad Zeed Alali Aldaher who submitted this new lottery scam as a warning to others.

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In a comment to one of the posts on the UK National Lottery scam, Tahani has kindly contributed what you get when sending in £577 for registering your claim. It’s a very phony looking certificate, and then they want £1500 more for your claim to go through with the payment process.

So, if you register (and send in whatever amount the scammers want you to pay for registering for you winnings), and then get a certificate that looks false or altered, it probably is. And this is what Tahani’s certificate looks like (with Tahani’s remarks and comments):

Thanks Tahani for sharing!

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The benevolent charity scammers are at it again. I still haven’t got a really good grip on how they carry these scams through, but this particular sting is extraordinally well written. Ahkmeed Paul Saidik, an incredibly welthy Dubaii merchant regrets his greedy life style after facing a cancer diagnosis, and wants help with giving his welth to charity:

	from		saik <saidik01@myway.com>
	reply-to			saidik01@myway.com
	date			Feb 6, 2007 12:55 PM
	subject			Treat as urgent

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Two big lottery prizes in just a couple of days! I missed this on Friday, but it’s almost too good to be true!  Alas I didn’t win the really large prize in the Euro Millones Lottery. (What language could that be anyway?) Only a “consolation cash prize” of 1,300,000:00 Euro. Too bad it’s a scam though.

How come people think that anyone would believe that someone paying out millions of Euro would use a hotmail address? Here’s the sting, a really poorly written lottery scam mail:

From:       e.millions71@hotmail.com
Subject:     CONGRATULATIONS!!! YOUR E-MAIL ID HAS WON. CONTACT AGENT FOR YOUR PRIZE.
Date:     2 February 2007 14:48:39 GMT+01:00
To:       undisclosed-recipients: ;

CONGRATULATIONS!!! YOUR E-MAIL ID HAS WON. CONTACT AGENT FOR YOUR PRIZE.
European Award Winning Prize.
Euro Millones Lottery Board
INTERNATIONAL PROMOTION /PRIZE AWARD.
FROM: THE LOTTERY COORDINATOR,
INTERNATIONAL PROMOTIONS/PRIZE AWARD DEPARTMENT
Paleisstraat 5, 2514 JA Den Haag:

Dear winner,

We wish to inform you that you have been approved as one of the lucky winner winners in the Euro Millones Lottery International Email Address draw on the 1st of February, 2007. All 5 winning addresses were randomly selected from a batch of 50,000,000 international email addresses. Your email address emerged alongside 4 others as a category 2 winner in the Euro Millones Lottery Draw.
Most recently this foundation set up the NEW LOTTERY SCHEME to give out prizes based on COMPUTER BALLOT SYSTEM. By doing this the foundation seek to encourage the use of Internet for academic and business pursuits.

Your email ID identified with Reference No: RJT/7438/TN and was selected by our E-games Random Selection System (ERSS) with entries from the 50,000,000 different email addresses enrolled for the E-game. Your email ID was included among the 50,000,000 different email addresses submitted by our partner international email provider companies.

You have won a consolation cash prize of 1.300,000:00 Euros (One Million Three Hundred Thousand Euro Only). The EUROPEAN EMAIL PROMOTION PROGRAM Group have approved a payout of your consolation cash prize which will be remunerated directly to you by the official Payment Agency Board.

We wish to congratulate you over your email success in our computer balloting sweepstake 2nd of February. This is a Millennium Scientific Computer Game in which email addresses were used. It is a promotional program aimed at encouraging internet users; therefore you do not need to buy a ticket to enter for it. You have been approving for the star prize of 1.300,000:00 Euros (One Million Three Hundred Thousand Euro Only).

Batch No:LF/53/849/TN
Ticket No:UW/83/02/TN
Lucky No: 52/658/95/TN
Ref No: RJT/7438/TN
Serial No: TM/YR38J/TN

To claim your winning prize you are to contact the appointed agent as soon as possible for the immediate release of your winnings:

Name: Mr. Donald Lucas.
ELECTRONIC MEDIA AGENCY B.V
Amsterdam, Netherlands.
Tel: +31-643-635-997
Fax: +31-847-272-428
Official Email: electronicmedia2@aol.com

You are advised to provide him with the under listed information as soon as possible:

1. Name in full
2. Address
3. Nationality
4. Age
5. Occupation
6. Phone/Fax

The appointed agent will be required to Notarize all your award winning documents in the Netherlandsl Court of justice in The hague and also obtain Approval Legal Clearance Certificate from the Court which is in accordance with the European Union Lottery Act 2002 on payment of International Lottery Winners. Be inform that the PAYING BANK will Effect Payment Swiftly upon satisfactory Report, Verifications and validation provided by this fiduciary agent.

Once again congratulations!!!.

Best Regards,

Elina Raynes(Mrs.).
(Group Coordinator)

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I almost thought I would never get another lottery notification mail, but this weekend, almost to my relief, this one slipped through my spam filters. I have never come caross the SWISS-LOTTO Satellite software email lottery before, and it differs a bit from other lottery scams since it actually parasites on a real lotto site, the quite legitimate SwissLos. However, there is no such thing as a UK subset of SwissLos, and if you know the first thing about the Swiss, you’d know that they are pretty good att taking care of money, and keeping records.

Besides. Why should a Swiss lottery send out emails using a domain such as hostle.net (the return path goes to nobody@webserver2.hostle.net)? And why on earth should they use a  yahoo.co.uk email address for correspondance?

The Swiss-Lotto UK is nothing but a sham and falsification. Here’s the mail, and yes, it happens to be sent out from

From:   internationalcoordinator@swisslotto.ch
Subject:     CONGRATULATIONS!!!…..YOU HAVE WON 750,000 Euros.
Date: 3 February 2007 07:52:06 GMT+01:00
To:   [a scraped]@lindqvist.com
Reply-to:   cordinator_swisslotto@yahoo.co.uk

SWISS LOTTO UK.
P O Box 1010
Liverpool, L70 1NL
UNITED KINGDOM
https://www.swisslotto.ch

CONGRATULATIONS!!!…..YOU HAVE WON  750,000 Euros

You have have been awarded 750,000 Euros in the SWISS-LOTTO Satellite software email lottery in which e-mail addresses are picked Randomly by software powered by the Internet through the worldwide website.

Your email address was amongst those chosen this year for the SWISS LOTTO Satellite lottery. And this promo is proudly sponsored by the SWISS-LOTTO UK organization.
You can log on to our website for more information concerning our entire lottery promo
https://www.swisslotto.ch .

Your email address,attached to Ref number 4, 12, 14,19,21, 31 with Serial number 1979-12 drew the lucky Numbers 35, and consequently won the lottery in the “A” Category.
You have therefore been approved for a lump sum pay out of 750,000 Euros

Please note that your lucky winning number falls within our European Booklet representative office in Europe as indicated in your play coupon.

In View of this, your 750,000 Euros will be released to you by our security firm in Europe. Our European agent will immediately commence the process to facilitate the release of your funds as soon as you contact them.

All participants Were selected randomly from World Wide Web site through computer draw System and extracted from over 300,000 companies and individual email addresses.
This promotion takes place annually. For security reasons, you are advised to keep your winning information confidential till your claims is processed and your money remitted to you in whatever manner you deem fit to Claim your prize. This is part of our precautionary measure to avoid double claiming and unwarranted abuse of this program by some unscrupulous elements.

To file for your claim, please contact our fiduciary agent:
Mr. Aron Baker,
Email:swisslottoclaimsagent06@yahoo.co.uk
Tel: +44 704 010 1519

Provide him with the information below:
1.Name:
2.Address:
3.Marital Status:
4.Occupation:
5.Age:
6.Sex:
7.Nationality:
8.Country Of Residence:
9.Telephone Number:
10.Fax Number:
11.Draw Number above:

This information facilitate the due process of the release of winnings avoid unnecessary delays and complications in the processing of your winnings.
Always remember to quote your Reference / serial number in any correspondences with us or our Designated agent.

Congratulations once more from all members and staff of This program and Thank you for being part of our promotional lottery program.

Sincerely,
Sharon Cole
Co-ordinator
SWISS LOTTO UK.
P O Box 1010
Liverpool, L70 1NL
UNITED KINGDOM
https://www.swisslotto.ch

N:B - PLEASE NOTE THAT ALL CORRESPONDENT WILL BE TEMPORARILY BE VIA EMAIL UNTIL 24 HOURS BEFORE PAY-OUT THEN YOU WILL BE NOTIFIED VIA TELEPHONE.

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This Lottery scam was submitted by a reader by mail a few weeks ago, but got stuck in one of my spam filters for a while. I rescued it just before emptying my Junk folder.

R. Johnsson, who submitted the mail, writes that she wants me to publish it warn others.

This is  a variation of the National Lottery scam, and as such it deserves a page of it’s own. And now it’s posted as a warning to anyone who gets the same mail. Don’t do what they ask you to. They’re just trying to get some money out of you.

The National Lottery
EURO MILLIONS PROMO/PRIZE DEPARMENT
Abbey Street Lower, Dublin 1, Ireland (Customer Services)
Ref: IR/9420X2/68
Batch: 074/05/ZY369

Dear Winner,

RE: YOUR WINNING NOTIFICATION!

We are pleased to inform you of the final announcement
of the Irish National Lottery 2007 Online Prommotion Result
held on the 20TH day of January 2007.You have won this lottery
as a result of random selection of emails from our microsoft
data base, this promotion takes place once in a year.

You have therefore, been approved to claim a total sum of
1,350,000 Euro.From the Irish Lottery Board.
For further information contact your fiduciary agent
DR. MARK O’MEARA Of the claims Department for your
FUND RELEASE VERIFICATION FORM.

Dr. Mark O’Meara
Claims Department
The IRNL Foundation
Email:drmarkomeara13@yahoo.co.uk
Tel: +44 (70) 1112-7993 +44 (70) 4570-2021

Just another lottery scam… It’s amazing they are still at this.

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Even though my spam filters seem to block all lottery scams these days, my readers still receive them. Here’s one from The Holland Casino Lotto Promo Int, submitted to me through the comment system, by Georg Pétur from Island. I’ve obfuscated the email addresses somewhat since I didn’t receive this one myself. Read the rest of this entry »

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It has actually been quite some time since I last received a lottery scam in my mail box. It’s not as if a miss them, but I must admit that the iScam section of this site could use some updates.

Either, the scammers have become smarter and now filter out my email address form their send lists, or my spam filters have become more intelligent and now filter out the scams. I use a double system with server filtering that takes out the really obvious stuff and just trash it instead of sending it on to me. Then Apple’s Mail.app filters out the spam that actually reaches my computer in a some times too efficient way. Its great, and even though I have used some email addresses for 10 years, I don’t see much spam.

So for a while I have thought that the lottery scammers and 419ers had given up. Until I started moving all those old pages about them into this blog that is. I’m actually overwhelmed by all the comments I’m getting.

Now, several people have reported that they’ve also recieved actual letters (you know, the kind with text written on paper, that come in envelopes with stamps on them). This is totally inline with my theory that email is a dying form of communication.

In January I’ve only seen two Swedish phishing attempts against Nordea, and the occational PayPal phishing.

Then again. Other people, tha lack my level of spam filtering, still get the scam mails. Maybe I’ll just have to turn the filter knobs down a bit again to get some entertainment?

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Since this summer, there has been reports about various SMS lottery scams, that are said to be originated in Sweden. Personally, I don’t really think they are. Even though they state an address for a Swedish Post Office Box in Gothenburg. Mark the spelling (not Gotenborg) as it is spelled in the sting mail. There might be a P O box there, but I vage that all incoming mail is resent somewhere else.

The person who sent me this mail asked how the scammers could have the number to his mobile phone as well as his email address. And I have been asking myself the same. But then I recall various forms that I have filled out on the www where I put my cellphone number in the phone field hoping that it would keep various phone sellers away.

Read the rest of this entry »

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Another Lottery scam rescued from my spam bucket. This one is even stamped as spam by the serverside junk filters. But it wasn’t certain enough to just send it into black space.

This lottery scam actullay has a fun twist to it. If I breach the confidentiality, they will send all of my two and a half million pounds to a charity organsization in South africa! And their spelling is even worse than mine is! Read the rest of this entry »

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I went through my Junk folder before emptying the 10,000 junk mails that have been accumulating there, and guess what I found? Yes! A few more lottery notifications. If anyone finds a door marked EU Online Lottery and Gaming Corporation somewhere… Please prove me wrong. Read the rest of this entry »

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The other day, I received an e-mail with what I first preceived as a very threatening content (see below). As it turned out the sender had confused me and Nikke’s Index with a Spanish lottery scam setup (probably the Loterie Nationale, El Gordo de la Primitiva Lottery International or any of their offsets).

The sender might have been a victim of these scammers him/herself, or has a friend or a relative who has. He or she has probably searched for the title of one of these e-mails, and found my site. (Lots of people do.) Most probably, the ironic pitch in my comments hasn’t come through to someone who is really upset and looking for a scapegoat. I guess that is what initiated the threat. But since I don’t think ignorance is an excuse for being rude and to send threatening e-mails, the mail conversation below stays. Read the rest of this entry »

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I just cannot understand why scammers, and especially lottery scammers find it so difficult to format their sting mails properly. In my oppinion, presentation just has to be vital in a good scam. Transfer these scam emails to the offline world, think for a minute or two. If a rugged person who can hardly speak or pronounce a single sentence in English where to approach you to convince you that you had just won a million Euros… Would you, even for a second believe him or her?

Now, I don’t even for a second believe that Ms Annalisa De Vart or Mr. Willem Bouwt wrote the below e-mail. But if they had, and if there indeed was a million dollar cash price waiting for me.
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Usually, I edit out the worst formatting errors from lottery scam e-mails like the one below. But usually, they just have a few hard line breaks. This one though, is almost hopelessly malformated. And the subject line… Which legitimate lottery agent would write PLZ BE INFORM in the subject line of a lottery notification? Of course, all the other marks are in place as well, such as an undisclosed-recipients in the mail-to field, a ridiculously large sum of money and of course the fact that they have randomly selected for a list of 50 million e-mail addresses.

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