I run a large number of websites and inevitably I get a load of SPAM emails. Most of them get caught by anti-spam but some of them get through. As I’m normally quite busy they just get deleted but every now and then I amuse myself and reply to them to see exactly what it is they are trying to do or how they are trying to scam me out of my hard earned cash.
Some of them are very authentic and the average person could easily fall for them, they look very professional, have all the right logos, etc… You can understand how people get caught up in them without realising before it is too late.
Once I get tired of playing with them, the ones I actually bother to reply to, I always make sure that I report them, but I never really know what happens as I delete the emails and block the email address from contacting me again. I had previously assumed that as I had ‘done the right thing’ by reporting the emails (normally from Gmail, Hotmail, etc…) to their corresponding abuse@ email addresses and got that automated reply quoting ‘…thank you for reporting this…’ that something was actually happening behind the scenes.
I think I have been wrong! I don’t think anyone (with the exception of Paypal) actually seem to care about it, nor do they seem to be doing anything about it.
The latest scam that I was sent and decided to play along to was from a Mrs. Jo Whelan at the UK Debt Management Office. Now whoever is behind this has done a bit of homework as they have copied the persons name and address from the official website.
After trying to see what it was they wanted (send them money to release some more money to me) I reported them to both AOL (where the email originated from) and to Action Fraud.
This was days ago and I’m still being harassed by the poor scammer who is desperate to get some cash out of me via Western Union. In the meantime, AOL have done NOTHING to block the email address, they haven’t even replied to me. Action Fraud have a complicated online system rather than an email address that one can just forward the email onto. I do not have the 20 minutes to fill in the form. I’m doing the right thing, I’m reporting it to avoid others not falling from the scam. I haven’t got the 20 minutes each time to fill out your forms!!
Talk about making it hard to do the right thing…
Anyway, if you get an email from Jo Whelan from the UK Debt Management Office asking to send money, now you know it’s a scam!