Spammers & Scammers
In addition to the traditional e-mail spam, the blog comment spam, we have personals spam. I may have commented on this before, with the flocks of Russian women who are "liking of your structure you placed online". Now the latest one I've been seeing are lures to try to get guys to go to webcam sites. It would probably be less obvious if they didn't use the exact same message every time. As soon as I see the words "web cam" I hit "delete". But enough guys must fall for it to make it worthwhile.
Part of that is probably because many guys want to believe that some hottie is interested in them, so they play along and let themselves get suckered in. Me, I guess I'm too suspicious.
One message on my MySpace personal looked genuine. The e-mail address looked legit, so I sent a brief reply from one of my little used alternate addresses. A day later I got a reply to that e-mail address. There was a Yahoo verification of the source e-mail address, the wording didn't match the form ones I'd seen so far, but there was a url to her personal website.
A flag goes up.
I look at the url. It doesn't look anymore suspicious than mine. I double check to make sure my anti-virus is running and my pop-up blocker is on, then copy and paste the url into a new window.
A normal looking website comes up. No pop up alarms go off. The first picture is of her in a grocery store and the text is about how she likes to eat healthy. Another pic of her by a realty sign talking about how she and her sister just bought a house together.
In the back of my head, a voice is pointing out that she looks like a mid-20's California blonde and why the hell would she ping a profile like mine?
I scroll down. There's a lingerie shot and a link for an adult verification system to see the more "interesting" pictures.
I mutter curse words in a few languages as I close the browser.
"Told you so" the voice in the back of my head says.
Part of that is probably because many guys want to believe that some hottie is interested in them, so they play along and let themselves get suckered in. Me, I guess I'm too suspicious.
One message on my MySpace personal looked genuine. The e-mail address looked legit, so I sent a brief reply from one of my little used alternate addresses. A day later I got a reply to that e-mail address. There was a Yahoo verification of the source e-mail address, the wording didn't match the form ones I'd seen so far, but there was a url to her personal website.
A flag goes up.
I look at the url. It doesn't look anymore suspicious than mine. I double check to make sure my anti-virus is running and my pop-up blocker is on, then copy and paste the url into a new window.
A normal looking website comes up. No pop up alarms go off. The first picture is of her in a grocery store and the text is about how she likes to eat healthy. Another pic of her by a realty sign talking about how she and her sister just bought a house together.
In the back of my head, a voice is pointing out that she looks like a mid-20's California blonde and why the hell would she ping a profile like mine?
I scroll down. There's a lingerie shot and a link for an adult verification system to see the more "interesting" pictures.
I mutter curse words in a few languages as I close the browser.
"Told you so" the voice in the back of my head says.
posted by Oz at 7:15 AM
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