Job scam quick guide: it's a scam if...

  • they want you to collect and forward money in any way (a "money mule" job). You'll wind up engaged in money laundering, personally defrauded via expertly forged cheques, money orders, etc, or defrauding someone else who pays for goods that never arrive.
  • they want you to receive packages and reship them somewhere else. The goods will have been obtained fraudulently, and they're just using you to make the shipping address appear local. You will be aiding fraud.
  • they want up-front payment (either to them or someone else) of any sort for anything before you can get the job. This is advance fee fraud: there is no job -- it's just a big con to extract money from you.
  • they want you to buy any kind of "membership" or "kit" in order to start. Forget it -- it's not a real job at all: they're trying to sell you something, and they're probably making a bunch of other false claims about it if they're pitching it as a "job".
  • it's a job offer, and it's spam. There are LOTS of these scams about, as you can see.

Tuesday, July 31, 2007

Colin Scowcroft

I've been slacking off a lot of late. This spam is anything but new -- it first arrived in my inbox around the 10th of July. At last count I have eighteen instances of it in that particular account's spam folder. The name "Colin Scowcroft" is undoubtedly fake, but it's consistently used as the sign-off in all the spams mentioned. Other than that, it's the usual money mule scam. This particular scammer churns through freemail addresses (mostly Gmail addresses of the form " FirstnameSurnameLetterLetter@gmail.com" at the moment) as contact points -- there is no website or dedicated domain name associated with the scam.

A representative sample of the spam follows.

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: [random name] <[random address]>
Date: Mon, 30 Jul 2007 15:32:22 -0180
Subject: International company is looking for talented persons for a respectable job. Infomation is attached.
To: [redacted]


Dear worker,
Our International  Corporation   is looking in search of new employees  on various  vacancies.
We suggest a ability for you to get financial Independence right now.
Only our Worldwide can suggest you to gather  a good earnings in a short period of time.
You do not need to spend any sum of money and
we do not ask you to give us with your bank account requisites!
We are occupied in absolutely official activity and working in our Worldwide
you can reach profession  growth  at a permanent  work.
We are in search of representatives from any point of the world globe .
Average earnings  of our employee  is 3450-4500$ per month, but you can earn get  more.

Here is the top 10 of our representatives  salaries:

Top 10 employees
----------------------
Per month:
1.45750 $
2.42185 $
3.38590 $
4.25808 euro
5.32000 $
6.15700 GBP
7.27200 $
8.24300 $
9.22750 $
10.18730 $

It is easy to be in ours Top 10!
Everything is simple  enough and it depends only of you.
We are waiting the creative  approach  and purposefulness  from our employee .
You can work full time or part time.
You settle on the timetable of you work at our International  .
We pay you for result . The best regional representative becomes
the chief of regional office of our company and grts a full social packet
and additional  at a rate of 50 % from his annual salary .
Many  of our worker have made excellent career, received full financial independence and
have embodied  all their dreams  in a reality less than in 2-3 years of working in our company.
The preference is given to employees with knowledge of foreign languages.

If you are interested in our offer please send us the following information:
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1) Full name
2) Address of residing
3) Phone numbers
4) Languages
5) Part time job/Full time

Please send this information to our email: RoyGarzaKM@gmail.com

Please specify in the subject line:
Application for the local rep position. Number 100711

If you are not interested in our offer or you received this email by
mistake please reply with Unsubscribe in subject line and specify all
your emails addresses to JodiThorntonFD@gmail.com
We are sorry for inconvenience

Yours faithfully,
Colin Scowcroft

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