Andd yet another scam

Everyday living
1

This time it is in the form of a “Judicial Summons” by the Court of New York" for the illegal use of software.
all I have to do to find out what it is about is to open the attached “Notice of Plaint” which is a zip file (i.e. ends in .zip).
Now the big thing about .zip files is that you can have self-extracting files that go on to install a piece of software on your PC.

If you are asked to click on a file that ends in .zip, DO NOT click on it.

You really have no idea of the sort of nasties that you may have installed if you do.

Geoff

2

Hey Doctor Geoff,

I may be a bit ignorant, but are these scams coming through via your emails, or on this forum? Also just out of curiosity becaue you always seem to know just how to reply to people on here, are you actually a DR?

Freckles x

3

Geoff is a retired psychologist Freckles, so you better be careful lol

4

You do get get your fair share of dodgy emails though Geoff

5

Psychology is a fascinating subject, did an AS exam a couple of years back (got a B grade- well chuffed). Love to see how individuals minds work!

Freckles x

6

Yes, so do I…love watching all the real crime programs. Watched a program the other week about Psychopaths…absolutely fascinating

7

The answer to Freckles is simple - YES I am a real Doctor.

That means that I have a fancy certificate that says that I have a Doctorate.

Please do note that a lot of the GPs nowadays are also Doctors (qualification) as well as doctors (courtesy title/job description).

Why do I get so many dodgy e-mails?
Simple, a lot of people have my e-mail address. Some of them are genuine citizens, some are “dubious”.
So, how does it work? Well, for a start, I was using e-mail before the World Wide Web came into existence. I had a presence on the Internet in a lot of areas (human vision, command and control psychology, training psychology, photography, old computers, genealogy, and other stuff) and on the US Defense Internet (don’t ask). So my address is out there.

The “less scrupulous people” of this world have software that trawls the Internet harvesting e-mail addresses. They put a few thousand onto a CD and sell copies for (typically) $20. Anyone who wants to mass mail a scam, a virus, a spam promotion, etc, can either buy mass mailing software, or set up their own, or go to someone who already has it. For a cost (variable, see previous sentence), the spam,scam, etc, gets mailed out to everyone on the CD. Now a whole lot of people get the message.

The scammer in particular does not care who gets the message as long as someone replies. That someone will provide, at the very least, another valid e-mail address that can be sold on. If you get an e-mail from someone you have never heard of, with a blank subject line, and no message … that means that someone has sent a message to your address to verify that it exists. They know that it exists because it does not bounce back. Yes, that means that some dishonest folk are selling CDs full of addresses that may not exist - how naughty of them.

That is why, for example, the address that my bank has for me is nothing like my normal address, and goes through a domain that I happen to own (call this elementary caution). So now you know why some of us post every scam that we come across, in the hope that it may save somebody else from a little grief.

Geoff