Psuedo-scamming?

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Hello I'm New here! Joined: 16 May 2010 Posts: 7

I was thinking about how potential victims could be educated. One way would be to harvest addresses from the same guestbooks Mugus use and send a relatively convincing script. When potential victims reply, send out a reply to them educating them about scams and telling them that, if this one had been real, they would have fallen prey.

The upside of this is that it targets those who are most vulnerable to scams (since those are the ones who reply).

This seems like a fairly obvious idea, so I'm wondering if it has been done before? Any thoughts?

Posted: Mon May 17, 2010 10:28 pm

Hi LovePotion9.

By sending out a script, you'd basically be lying to the victim.
And if you're lying to the victim to start with, why would they trust you? Not so much here on Eater, but on our sister site www.scamwarners.com, we rely on our honesty and integrity when dealing with victims. It's probably the main weapon in our armoury and using the approach you suggest could seriously undermine it.

Also, scripts have a habit of getting out to lads. Send a victim a script and the next thing you know, it's being used in a real scam - and we don't give the lads anything that they can use. Wink

Then you've got to consider that what you'd be doing is illegal - even with the best of intentions. If Law Enforcement come across your format, they're not going to be aware of your motives and you may end up having to answer some pretty uncomfortable questions.

Finally, you send out a script to addresses on a guestbook and you're probably going to end up with at least a dozen baiters on your back (not all from this site). That would cause a heckuva lot of confusion.

Posted: Mon May 17, 2010 10:31 pm

All the ones that don't reply, and won't get your 2nd email, are ITPs. Mass mailing people stuff they don't want is not nice.

Mass education is a good thing, and may in fact be the only real weapon against scams, but spamming formats around is not an elegant method.

ETA: grrr. ninja'd by a rodent

Posted: Mon May 17, 2010 10:32 pm

LP9, it involves mail-bombing a script.

Many victims can't be talked out of an idea though when they hear
the right words from a scammer and can't be talked out of it by those closest to them. You asked for thoughts. It's why the sister-site scamwarners exists, and that is the idea. To direct potential victims to info. re: scams.

(You have a PM answer from me re: lucked into a smart one, from the "are they getting smarter" thread.) And welcome to the forums and site by the way.

Hello I'm New here! Joined: 16 May 2010 Posts: 7

I see what you mean. Well, so much for that crazy idea.

Posted: Tue May 18, 2010 1:12 am

Welcome to eater, LP9. Keep the creative juices flowing. Your next one may be brilliant. We all learn a little bit including from the "crazy" ideas.

Posted: Tue May 18, 2010 8:59 am

I thrive on crazy ideas! Twisted Evil

(I'm a technomancer, it's my purpose in life to have crazy ideas Wink

)

But yeah, sometimes the next crazy idea might turn out to be the next big scammer's headache. So don't be discouraged. Very Happy

Posted: Tue May 18, 2010 9:26 am

LovePotion9 wrote:

I see what you mean. Well, so much for that crazy idea.

Don't let that get you down.
As a new baiter, it's better that you post your ideas before putting them into practice so people can examine them.
And it's also excellent that you've only been here a couple of days but are already coming up with ideas. Thumbs up

Sure, there are some ideas that won't work. But keep going at it and who knows? Maybe you'll come up with the next major modality for baiters to use.

If you do plan to stick around (and we hope you do), it's always advisable to get yourself a mentor - basically an experienced baiter who can help to guide you through the early days until you find your feet.

You can sign up here: http://forum.419eater.com/forum/cherrie_mentor_program.php

Posted: Tue May 18, 2010 9:49 am

Welcome LovePotion9!
I agree with other people here, and please don't be discouraged. It's great to see a new member here coming in with "crazy ideas" - anti-scam efforts would be far less effective if it weren't for crazy ideas that got things started in the first place. Devious, clever people are very welcome here.

Posted: Tue May 18, 2010 10:48 am

Welcome LovePotion9!

I read your other post here and can understand your feelings about baiting. I had similar feeling but that soon changed after reading some victim horror stories.

If you really want to help and educate potential victims, visit www.scamwarners.com and have a look around there. I have found that exposing the scammers is one of the best ways to help prevent people from falling for their scams. Scamwarners is how I got here.

Posted: Tue May 18, 2010 10:59 am

Stick at it Smile

Welcome, btw.