Scams

[The fourth cyber freedom: “Freedom from Online Scams (End to Violations of Private Space and Being Duped by Techno Pirates).” Art by Viktor Koen.]

Most of the scam-mails I receive — “Hello, my dear,” &c. — go straight to spam. But two unusual scam-mails recently showed up in my inboxes. Here’s one that came to my blogging e-mail address:

Hello,

I hope this message finds you well. I am       from      . I was looking for some artwork online and I found your contact while surfing and I must tell you, You are doing a great job, I would really love to purchase some of your works for my wife as a surprise present regarding our forthcoming 30th anniversary, I would like to receive further information about your piece of work and what inspires you. However, I would greatly appreciate if you could possibly recommend a few completed pieces of your artworks that is ready for immediate sales within my price range ($1,000- $15,000).

Hope to hear from you soon.

Best regards,

     .

I enjoy close-reading this sort of nonsense to see how many tells I can spot. The lack of a name after “Hello,” the weirdly genteel “I hope this message,” the announcement of a name that has no relation to the sender’s e-mail address, the wobbly syntax and grammar and punctuation, the utter improbability of “looking for some artwork online,” the lack of specificity about what the sender likes about my art.

My art? This e-mail no doubt results from a search for blogs with “art” in their titles or close by. And I’ll add: the only people who ever tell me that I'm doing “a great job” online are spammers, when they leave comments telling me to keep up the good work and that they’ll definitely be back, followed by a link for whatever. (That’s why I moderate comments.)

I was not surprised to discover that this e-mail is one instance of a ploy, explained in a public Facebook group, Stop Art Scams. Long story short: the “buyer” 1. overpays with a fake check and asks the seller to wire back the overage or 2. sends a fake PayPal receipt. I assume that with 2. the same overpayment scheme kicks in.

Here’s a second, loonier scam, which came to my university e-mail address:

Hi, my name is     .I am a staff here in       .My uncle is moving to the school area and needs someone who can pet sit or and walk his English Bull dog 2 hours daily within 9am-11pm.Pay is $300 weekly. Kindly email him for more info      @hotmail.com.You are to contact him with your personal email NOT school email so he can receive your email because most times I email him with my school email he hardly receive my emails.

This e-mail appears to spoof a student (not staff) account. Here too there’s plenty in the sender’s syntax and grammar and punctuation to arouse suspicion. There are also the improbably convenient conditions and great pay: just two hours a day, at $21.42 an hour. Even a professor emeritus might leap at that kind of money. While the art scam-mail is sketchy in its lack of specificity, this e-mail is sketchy in its elaborate explanation of why it’s necessary to use a personal e-mail account. I think that we can all figure out why the sender wants to keep further correspondence off the university server.

I cut and pasted part of the text of this e-mail into DuckDuckGo, and look what I found (with the same Hotmail address, which I’ve redacted):

Hi, my name is      .I am a staff here in      .My uncle is moving to the school area and needs someone who can pet sit or and walk his English Bull dog 2 hours daily within 9am-11pm.Pay is $300 weekly. Kindly email him for more info      @hotmail.com.You are to contact him with your personal email NOT school email so he can receive your email because most times I email him with my school email he hardly receive my emails.

What puzzles me is how this scheme is supposed to work. Do I, as an aspiring dog-walker, wire a deposit to show my good faith? Does the uncle send me a check for a month’s pay and then — oops — ask me to send part of it back? What say you, Uncle?

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