Is this a scam?

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Hello I'm New here! Joined: 20 Oct 2008 Posts: 2

A friend of mine uses this site and siggested posting here, they aren't sure wether it is a scam or not either.

I left a comment on a public post a few months ago regarding a religious experience, I included my email address because I wanted to allow people who wanted to know more to communicate with me. I'm well aware of the usual scams, and wasn't worried about getting spammed, I get enough already.

However today I received an email from someone, they don't speak a lot of english and the way they're speaking, I don't think they really have experienced what they're saying they have. I thought it might just be a language barrier, except that in the second email they told me they had trouble sending from the original email address and switched to a second, something I know is often a tell of a scammer.

I'm using hotmail, so I don't know if I can get headers to check the IP, and even if I did it's entirely possible I'm speking to an african about this.

So are scammers known to go completely off script and reply to a persons comments, or are they always on script without exclusion.

EDIT: if it means anything, the name is 3l$p3th hugh3$

419Eater is my life Joined: 19 Sep 2006 Posts: 416

If you post a copy of the text (minus any traceable details ) then we can let you know very quickly if it's a scam.

I'm not sure whether knowing the IP will help very much at this stage.

N

Posted: Mon Oct 20, 2008 11:01 am

Can you post the Email for us to take a look at?

It might make judgement a little bit easier.... Wink

Then, if it does appear to be a scam, we can tell you how it works, and what action you can next expect from the scammer.

Posted: Mon Oct 20, 2008 11:02 am

Hi!
First of all, welcome here!

A little question: do they have any of your RL data?
Real name, real address or so?

Second, the most useful would be to post here the e-mail(s) you sent and received, inculded the headers if possible.
By erasing your real datas if any off course Smile

EDIT: DAMNED!!!
How fast do I have to be??? Very Happy

Posted: Mon Oct 20, 2008 11:02 am

questions12 Not enough information. Please provide more.

ETA Damn, beaten to it by other posters.

Hello I'm New here! Joined: 20 Oct 2008 Posts: 2

lol seems people are more than willing to help, they're tripping over each other to help out Razz

She has my real name, thats all.

I'm on hotmail, and can't find a way to access headers, if there is could you let me know? I'm happy to post those. I wish I'd left my gmail account now, I know headers there.

The thing is, we are speaking about something personal, if, in fact, she is legitimate the last thing I want to do is post this in a public forum without permission, if it's real it's something that should not be shared, not even annonymously.

There's been no requests for money yet, only two emails in, the flags that have been raised to me is just the broken english, the fact the name used dosent match the email address, the email address switch, and just a sence that she hasn't actually experienced what she's telling me. also she began by saying her life was in danger, and this is the sort of thing that can easily lead to "please bring me to your country to escape all this"

All I really wanted to know was wether scammers have been known to respond to comments and things on a person to person basis without their script, as I can tell this isn't scripted.[/quote]

Posted: Mon Oct 20, 2008 11:48 am

There are so many scripts out there that scammers use... Without some actual text, it's hard to be sure.

PM me the text and I give my word that if I cannot be certain that it is a scammer, I will discard the text and not reveal it to a living soul; if I'm certain that it's from a scammer, I'll let you know privately.

Trophy Videos · Posted: Mon Oct 20, 2008 11:53 am

Quote:

There's been no requests for money yet, only two emails in, the flags that have been raised to me is just the broken english, the fact the name used dosent match the email address, the email address switch, and just a sence that she hasn't actually experienced what she's telling me. also she began by saying her life was in danger, and this is the sort of thing that can easily lead to "please bring me to your country to escape all this"

Welcome to eater, questions 12. This sounds like it could be the start of a love scam or orphan type scam. If you want to keep things private, you may PM one of the Moderators here, and they will help you sort this out. These scams don't immediately ask for money, but slowly suck you into their script and try to make you believe them, THEN they ask for money for whatever they can dream up. They are trying to take advantage of your religious beliefs and charitible feeling towards others.

EDIT: didn't see your post, yastreb. I was posting, too. You may pm yastreb as well if you want to.

Baiting Guru Joined: 07 Jan 2007 Posts: 2922

If you want to check for yourself google the persons name, email address and phone numbers. If they've been used before in scams google may find them. Oh and for the name you may wish to put it in speech " marks and add scam after the name.

You can also check where they say they are against where their email is sent from and this can be done by...

Quote:

If you want to find out where his email comes from then have a read here how to find headers, then copy and paste the header into this http://headertool.apelord.com/

After that take the last (bottom) number and put it in here http://www.ip-adress.com/ipaddresstolocation/

Hope this helps.

Wannabe Baiter Joined: 12 Sep 2008 Posts: 90

And if it *is* a scam, then it should probably be posted to a public forum, so that others with questions like you might be able to google it.

Posted: Tue Oct 21, 2008 1:41 am

Welcome "Questions12" Have you perhaps considered that there telling you what you want to hear. and they will ask you for money sooner or later. The chances are it's a man, your corresponding with and not a woman. Easiest way to test if he's "on script" is to ask him a direct question, If it's a scam , they will ignore it, as quite often they don't even read your reply's they just send the next script.

But post what you have received, Don't worry about hurting anyone's feelings, If it's genuine then it will stand out, like dogs balls.

Your only worry, is they have your real name, which might access who knows what about yourself, given they know how to access it.. invent a new character, on a new e-mail account, and see if you get the same e-mails back.. Chances are you will. Then you can start baiting him.

Posted: Tue Oct 21, 2008 1:56 am

Many native English speakers don't speak good English and there are baiters here and victims too who don't speak perfect English as it isn't their first language, so the quality of writing is not a guide, nor is the place they're mailing from, unless they claim to be from somewhere else.

The despicable fact is that scammers look upon religion, emotion and disability as weaknesses to be exploited. If you have your defences and sensors active, then I would just treat it as a normal exchange until you find it's turning into something else.

Even though I bait I am still able to lead a normal healthy (sort of) life, which is another way of saying, if you know what to look for, why worry ? The scammers I have tracked to religious sites aren't usually very subtle in their true intent, so you'll find out soon enough.

Posted: Tue Oct 21, 2008 2:07 am

Some warning signs are-

-talking about money
-saying they're related to you
-talking about "being friends" (after a few emails, their sister/mother/son/dog will get in a horrible accident and they'll see if they can convince you to send them money to "help")

But yeah, if you post it people could probably tell right off if it's legit or not.