Police on the hunt for a lad in Toronto!

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Hello I'm New here! Joined: 19 Jul 2009 Posts: 19

TORONTO -- An Internet con artist has targeted hundreds in upscale Toronto neighbourhoods in recent days, preying on the goodwill of people led to believe their friends are stranded overseas and need money now.

Police are trying to track down the culprit, but cyber crime can originate anywhere in the world, making it difficult to make an arrest.

The fraud begins when the hacker finds a way into a private e-mail account and changes the password so the account is inaccessible to the owner, Det. Murray Barnes of Toronto police said yesterday.

The hacker then poses as the owner of the account and spams everyone on the address list, claiming to be stranded in a foreign city such as Birmingham, England.

He or she pleads with friends to send money.

Those who reply typically get brief responses urging them to send the money quickly via Western Union--meaning the funds can be accessed from anywhere.

http://www.calgarysun.com/news/canada/2009/08/10/10412186-sun.html

I can honestly say Ive never heard of this format!

Mod edit - Combined your posts - NN

Posted: Tue Aug 11, 2009 7:38 am

We have

There's a few topics here of scammers trying to phish an e-mail addy. We've 'helped' a few of them by loading a fresh hotmail addy with baiter addresses and then giving the lad the password, effectively handing him a list of baiters for his (and our) entertainment.

Posted: Tue Aug 11, 2009 7:47 am

a recent famous(at least in the UK) example

UK Justice Secretary Jack Straw has been the victim of Nigerian fraudsters who sent out hundreds of e-mails in his name asking for money.

The e-mails claimed he had lost his wallet on charity work in Africa and needed 3,500 US dollars to get home.

Messages headed the Right Hon Jack Straw MP were sent to council bosses, government chiefs and others.

The fraudsters are thought to have hacked into computers at Mr Straw's Blackburn constituency office

Posted: Tue Aug 11, 2009 8:53 am

Quite a common scam. The only odd feature is that the police are actually investigating this example. Possibly the account holder has more influence with the police than most.

Quote:

hundreds in upscale Toronto neighbourhoods

Posted: Tue Aug 11, 2009 9:07 am

Quote:

claiming to be stranded in a foreign city such as Birmingham, England

That's really mean. As if being stranded in Lagos wasn't bad enough. Confused

419Eater is my life Joined: 10 Jul 2008 Posts: 366

There were a couple of local stories on this this morning. My RL is near Toronto. As far as I can tell it is standard email phising scam.
My RL email addy has had two email phishing messages in the last few days. Both are now dead.

One last Friday was a generic using a online free forms website to create a phising script and hide behind a legitiment front.

The one monday was looking for yahoo account information.

p.

Posted: Wed Aug 12, 2009 4:44 pm

I received one of these about a year ago in the name of a client of our firm. I called him and we had a good laugh about it.

Then I wrote back to the scammer, told him what an a**hole I had always thought he had been, and that I thought it was funny and well deserved that he was stranded in London, England.

Posted: Wed Aug 12, 2009 4:55 pm

If you aren't worried about possible malware, and want to fill in their form, the quickest jape is to fill it in this way

Quote:

Gomer Pyle
********

Then they don't know if it's a real password, their forms gone screwy or they're dealing with someone completely stupid.

Posted: Thu Aug 13, 2009 7:36 am

Its odd because a lad I am baiting now has his IP in canada!!

Posted: Thu Aug 13, 2009 8:36 am

^^ Outside of West Africa, Canada has one of the highest proportions of scammers.

The lads love it there.

Not quite a Newb Joined: 31 May 2009 Posts: 76

Oh great.. another thing us Canadians can be proud of!! loll

Trophy Videos · Posted: Thu Aug 13, 2009 2:29 pm

Don't worry, SmokinKrabbs. You have Dudley Do-Right on your side and he always gets his man. Wink

Posted: Thu Aug 13, 2009 4:57 pm

Slightlyoutofit wrote:

^^ Outside of West Africa, Canada has one of the highest proportions of scammers.

Parliament's in recess so the boys and girls've gotta find something to do Laughing

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