A thought on fighting scammers

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Hello I'm New here! Joined: 23 Jul 2009 Posts: 1

Hello, all. Newbie here, I found your website and it is quite interesting. I had a thought last night, though. Why go after the scammers so indirectly? It seems to me that a faster (and possibly more effective) method of attack would be to go after their computers, rather than the actual people. A common, if cruel, internet prank involves sending what appears to be a text file to someone, which is actually a .bat file (most random people don't know about this, so not many catch on in time). Basically, when they open it, it gives the computer all kinds of nasty orders.

A common one has your computer reset several minutes after it is opened. Worse than that, however, is that it gives your computer orders to shut down upon startup every time, so unless the victim knows enough about computers to get in and remove it themselves, they must either go through the lengthy process of re-installing their OS (and thus losing all the data on their computer) or spending several hundred dollars on a new one.

This may not seem as effective as leading them along for several months, but consider it. During those months, you are not their only victim, and they spend only a small amount of their time dealing with you. This method, though it may not last as long, wil disrupt ALL of their current attacks. It can also be done much faster, as you must only talk with them enough to convince them to open what appears to be a regular text document.

Thoughts?

Posted: Thu Jul 23, 2009 2:53 pm

from up there ^ 419 Eater forum rules

We do not support the sending of viruses and “trojans” to the scammers, nor attempts to hack or hijack their email accounts and/or computers. Viruses and “trojans” will be unknowingly spread to the computers of innocent people and we are only trying to make it difficult for the scammers. On top of that, the spreading of viruses and hacking attempts is an illegal activity in the UK, where this Board is located, as well as many other jurisdictions. Please do not start topics on such subjects. Such threads can and will be deleted on sight

419Eater is my life Joined: 15 Apr 2009 Posts: 296

They mostly use internet cafes- all a virus does is screw over the cafe owner. The scammer just switches machines.

Posted: Thu Jul 23, 2009 2:59 pm

This is very much against our rules as stated in the FAQ's.

Standard procedure ( whatever happened to him? - last logged in Dec 08 ) is for a moderator to lock these threads, but leave them up for others to see, so CLICK!

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