I'm a targeted as a victim!!!

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Not quite a Newb Joined: 07 Mar 2007 Posts: 48

Hi

This is unbelievable....

I've set up a website for a center that helps HIV positive mothers in South Africa. Now someone has taken info from the webpage and written a targeted scam mail to me.

I've been to the center and know the people who run it. The email is sent from Nigeria and probably only to my address. The reply-to address is that of my friend and chairperson of the center. My address only appears in the whois info of the domain name, together with all my real address, phone number etc....

It's a default "I'm in London and have been robbed. Can you please send £1000 to me with Western union now....bla bla bla...." And signed with the name of the Chairperson of the center.

It's possible that this is a scam sent as spam to a lot of people, but it seems like to much of a coincident.

Sorry for the lack of details, but this includes all my personal info.

What really sucks is that I'm afraid this will hurt the center helping the children.... Sad

I've received the email just 4 hours ago, and I'm not sure what to do. For now I'm only waiting to see if anything else shows up.... Maybe the problem will disappear if all is quite. ...

Posted: Fri Sep 04, 2009 9:42 pm

I'm sorry but I had trouble pieceing the whole situation together. The information provided was a bit scant.

Could you elaborate?

Not quite a Newb Joined: 07 Mar 2007 Posts: 48

Basically it seems like the scammer has paired the whois info of the domain with the info on the webpage. That far more than I'd expect from a lad! Haven't been in the game for some years now.

The scary thing is that it's targeted towards me personally. When I read the mail my first thought was that I would help her, because it came from her usual email address. However, sending money over western union is not how I help friends.

Posted: Fri Sep 04, 2009 9:51 pm

It is possible that they are trying to target only you thinking you personally would just shell out money for someone you know. More likely is that they are spamming it around hoping someone checks it out and sends some money. It's not the first time something like this has happened and it won't be the last. Since the lad is trying to align his scam with your site, you may want to put a notice on your site warning people about the scam in the hope they go to your site to verify the lad is who they claim to be.

Juan's stalker Joined: 28 Aug 2008 Posts: 1423

Do you have her personal phone number to call her?
Im sure if they have accessed her account all her contacts will get this email and they may want to help her.
Each email will probably be personalized to that person, you are just on her list of contacts.
Her contacts need to be warned it is not her and she needs to close her account or try to get it back. I would just close it and make another if this is what has happened.
Glad you trusted your instincts. I hope the others do too.

Not quite a Newb Joined: 07 Mar 2007 Posts: 48

Here is the email:

Quote:

date 4 September 2009 18:52
subject Sad News!!!
mailed-by yahoo.com
Signed by yahoo.com

hide details 18:51 (4 hours ago)

How are you doing?please i will need this personal until when i get back okay?right now i am in London,i had to attend a very important meeting which i was not able to anymore due to the incident that happened here at the hotel,you will not believe this,i got robbed off everything i brought down with me including my wallet and luggage's too,right now i am so confused down here and don't know what else to do,please i will be very happy if you could help me send down £1,000 so i can add up with the money i raised from my very good friend?i will make sure i refund you the money as soon as i get back.please you will help me have the money sent to me through western union since luckily for me i still have my passport here with me,just in case here is the information you will require to send down the money to me right away,i need settle the hotel bill i am owing here so i can leave here at once.

Name: XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Address: XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
London

After sending me the money u will send me the information on the receipt so i can pick up the money okay thank u so much,i will be waiting for you online so i can hurry right away to the western union office to collect the money.

Thank you so much
XXXXXXXXXX..

Email is sendt from IP: 41.191.109.130 which traces back to Nigeria.

Not quite a Newb Joined: 07 Mar 2007 Posts: 48

@Dramaqueen

The thought that it might be her email that's compromised didn't strike me until now. That would be a VERY bad thing! Shocked

She probably has government officials on her contact list. Exclamation

Juan's stalker Joined: 28 Aug 2008 Posts: 1423

I do hope you can warn her by phone not email and she in turn can warn her contacts. Confused

Even if she tried to change her password on her account it might be sent to go to another account the scammer has access to.
I personally would make another email account and not use the same name, same security questions or passwords.
Start all over and be safe. Good luck.

Not quite a Newb Joined: 07 Mar 2007 Posts: 48

Received-SPF: pass (google.com: domain of [email protected] designates 67.195.22.86 as permitted sender) client-ip=67.195.22.86;
Authentication-Results: mx.google.com; spf=pass (google.com: domain of [email protected] designates 67.195.22.86 as permitted sender) [email protected]; dkim=pass (test mode) [email protected]
Received: (qmail 6832 invoked by uid 60001); 4 Sep 2009 16:51:51 -0000
DKIM-Signature: v=1; a=rsa-sha256; c=relaxed/relaxed; d=yahoo.com; s=s1024; t=1252083111; bh=K71FksGExoF12FJ/TOiV3JexuwDgZ9PSuiQNNGqMzTk=; h=Message-ID:X-YMail-OSG:Received:X-Mailer:Date:From:Subject:To:MIME-Version:Content-Type;
s=s1024; d=yahoo.com;
h=Message-ID:X-YMail-OSG:Received:X-Mailer:Date:From:Subject:To:MIME-Version:Content-Type;

Message-ID: <[email protected]>
X-YMail-OSG:
Received: from [41.191.109.130] by web112019.mail.gq1.yahoo.com via HTTP; Fri, 04 Sep 2009 09:51:51 PDT
X-Mailer: YahooMailClassic/6.1.2 YahooMailWebService/0.7.338.2
Date: Fri, 4 Sep 2009 09:51:51 -0700 (PDT)

Cleaned up coding. TS

Not quite a Newb Joined: 07 Mar 2007 Posts: 48

It was the email address that was comprimised! Thank you!

Just got of the phone with her. She is busy warning people. People have already been scammed and lost money! Evil or Very Mad

I am so sad and mad right now...this is soooo bad I almost want to cry.....

Posted: Fri Sep 04, 2009 10:56 pm

^^ I don't know if this approach will work but it may help some victims if the website was updated with a scam warning for visitors and a few links to anti-scam resources elsewhere.

There is an allied website called ScamWarners whose members specialise in helping scam victims. Touch base with any of the moderators or admins there and discuss how you'll be able to recover from a bad situation.

Hope all goes well Smile

Not quite a Newb Joined: 07 Mar 2007 Posts: 48

Web site is updated....

Juan's stalker Joined: 28 Aug 2008 Posts: 1423

reodor, make sure her other contacts know that if the money hasn't been picked up yet the transaction can be stopped even if they did send money.

They need to get in touch with their WU and tell them it is a scam.
I think they can get their money back if it hasn't been picked up yet.
Since you only got the email today maybe the other contacts did too and they can get the transaction stopped before the money is picked up by the scammer.

Not quite a Newb Joined: 07 Mar 2007 Posts: 48

That's a good idea. I've forwarded it. It's 1:43 in the morning here now. Don't know if she is still up. Think I should get som sleep also.

The email account is at least locked, so the scammers can't use it anymore.

It must be a nightmare to have your email account hacked and abused like that.

Not quite a Newb Joined: 07 Mar 2007 Posts: 48

Hi

An update on this incident.
We now have control over the email again. The chances of catching the lads are probably small, but I'll help in collecting evidence and file a police report.

Contacted WU and Yahoo asking for logs and evidence.

These lads deserve jail, but I know the chance of that happening is very very small if existing at all.... Evil or Very Mad

Posted: Sun Sep 06, 2009 10:16 pm

For what it's worth, get as much detail into that dossier for the police as you can - all the email headers or any sort of account useage logs will be helpful. I have it on good authority that the police are making extended use of the full headers now, and although as you say a direct prosecution may be tough in this case, well maybe just maybe it's possible, and it's all beneficial.

I hate the shits who do this. If your friend had government people on her list, when she sends out the I was hacked email to everyone, maybe it will add just that bit more pressure for the governments to apply that bit more pressure on in this case Nigeria to clean up its act. It's poorish, but it's not like it's the poorest country on earth, so it must come down to political and cultural will, ultimately.

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