Closing lad accounts - good idea or bad idea?

By joining our community you will have the ability to post topics and access other forums reserved for members. Registration is quick, simple and absolutely free. Join our community today by clicking here.

Hello I'm New here! Joined: 18 Dec 2006 Posts: 14

For about a year, I have been diligently forwarding full headers etc. of spam from my personal account to abuse@*.com or report_spam@*.com to their appropriate ISPs.

MY AD HOC TAXONOMY

= Lower Level Accounts =

However, the 419 spam I report is what you might call "lower level" accounts: those initial, bulk-emailed messages that contain Reply-To addresses (invariably free webmail) that introduce the con. The lads correctly assume that these accounts will be shut down fairly quickly (reported by typical, concerned Netizens) and it's a race between innocent victims and the ISP's delay in deleting the account.

= Mid-Level Accounts =

Mid-level addresses are sent to victims who respond to the first message, and without exception notify the victim to contact a barrister or a courier or some other third party at another email address, for 2 very important reasons: 1) to increase credibility of the con, and 2) to provide a less temporary address not publicized by the initial spam. A mid-level address may last for months until a victim/s starts to suspect something and reports it.

Mid-level accounts may also include those which are created after previous accounts have been closed.

I have always assumed that scammers have back-up victim contact info and can regain contact after account closures. I have also assumed that experienced scam baiters gave their lads a verbal smackdown after email account changes, and therefore I've had absolutely no regrets in reporting lower *and* mid-level accounts. I have always believed that forcing lads to switch accounts gives scambaiters easy opportunities to punish the lads. I would appreciate your clarification on this matter if this is not true.

= High Level Accounts =

"High level" addresses, to me, are those which the scammer has paid for to establish fake banks, courier services, or escrow services. The scammer has actually purchased a domain name and a host (perhaps with a fake credit card) to trick the victim into believing they are legit. I have also had no regrets in reporting such accounts.

= Consensus? =

According to the responses in this thread:

a) High level accounts must be closed, no question.
b) Mid-level accounts should NOT be closed as it scotches scambaiters' time.
c) Lower-level accounts posted in "Surplus Letters" should NOT be closed.
d) Phone lad accounts must be closed, no question.

For the record, I haven't reported any letters posted to 419eater's Surplus, because my personal email's spam filter has more than enough 419 crap for me to forward. I also don't want to spoil a scambaiter's fun.

However, if my reporting of the lower and mid-level accounts from my personal email potentially spoils an active bait (unbeknownst to me), I will back off. What say the forum?

Posted: Thu Mar 29, 2007 3:06 am

^^^ What, perchance, would a seasoned baiter's response be if a high level (oga) account was closed during a bait? If they have a top level lad, they're probably working toward securing an arrest and closing the account could scotch any chance of that happening.

KEEP OFF

Hello I'm New here! Joined: 18 Dec 2006 Posts: 14

Good point.

So, to modify the consensus:

a) High level accounts must NOT be closed, because it could foil an arrest.
b) Mid-level accounts should NOT be closed as it scotches scambaiters' time.
c) Lower-level accounts posted in "Surplus Letters" should NOT be closed.
d) Phone lad accounts must be closed, no question.

Therefore, account-closers should focus on Phone lads, as they are not top level scammers?

Posted: Thu Mar 29, 2007 4:26 am

yes

Posted: Thu Mar 29, 2007 4:29 am

preemptivecynth wrote:

Therefore, account-closers should focus on Phone lads, as they are not top level scammers?

It has nothing to do with the "level". If it is not a phone lad, leave the damn thing alone.

Hello I'm New here! Joined: 18 Dec 2006 Posts: 14

@YeaWhatever

Cool.

May I suggest that an addendum to the Sticky for Surplus Letters, or even an updated "Scammer Baiting Hints and Tips" at
http://419eater.com/html/baiting.htm
include tips for 419 members who prefer to be account closers instead of extended scambaiters?

I personally can't commit consistent time (or the stomach) to string along a douchebag lad for months, but I do have short, random bursts of time that make it more convenient for me to report scam accounts to the proper authorities.

I want to contribute to the greater good and to reduce the overall number of victims of fraud.

Should I post a thread at "TECHNICAL RELATED QUESTIONS, PROBLEMS & REQUESTS FOR 419EATER FORUM"?

What's the best way to go about this?

Posted: Thu Mar 29, 2007 5:19 am

preemptivecynth wrote:

I want to contribute to the greater good and to reduce the overall number of victims of fraud...

What's the best way to go about this?

Two words, Phone Lads
Very Happy

Posted: Thu Mar 29, 2007 6:32 am

I'm wondering if it would be helpful to just jam their accounts with huge files. . . to the point where they can't receive any more. Some of the myway email addresses allow as much as 10 MB of e-mail space, so it would take a concerted, sustained effort. It would be more timely than waiting for an ISP to turn off their accounts.

I've gotten a huge number of these since the new year - almost one a day. I've started keeping a list of all the addresses, and forwarding the scam letter to everyone on the list when I get one.

I can't help but wonder if this new rash is a case of a bunch of weiners with get rich quick dreams buying address lists from the more seasoned veterans. You know these clowns will prey off each other. I bet one of them is selling worthless victim lists containing people who have already gotten thousands of 419 letters.

Posted: Thu Mar 29, 2007 7:56 am

^^^ Sounds like Email bombing to me. It's also ILLEGAL and would breach mail and internet service providers acceptable use policies / Terms of Service Agreements. Employers also tend to be rather unforgiving when staff abuse their network privileges.

Here's an interesting snippet from a useful resource:

Quote:

... So, what can you do instead of mail-bombing? Well, if the reason you want to mail-bomb somebody is because they said something that irritated you or did not fit with your beliefs, you may want to stop and act your age. If somebody says something that irritates you, you can always just ignore them. If you really want to, send *one* reply back to them pointing out why they irritated you. Take care of the problem in a logical and civilized way. ....

Taken from HERE.

You should read THIS too.

Oh, and welcome to the 'Eater Wink

Posted: Thu Mar 29, 2007 11:39 am

Krona wrote:

It's more expensive and more difficult to set up a Web site to support your scam, but once you make that step you have automatically made your scam more believable - we have a number of baiters who have set up Web sites to support their baits (myself included) because those sites lend credence to the baits.

So you get the sites shut down when they are at Bluetower. There are still hosters in cash starved countries (like the Chinese ones mentioned above) that don't even seem to have abuse departments. Sooner or later you'd have the cream of the crop scamming from there.

My point is, they don't, and I've been watching for three years to see if it would happen (and other killers were working for years before I came along). The number of "undeadables" on Chinanet, or Savvis, or XO, is still a ridiculously small percentage.

Another point that makes my analogy inaccurate, however, is that fake bank designers aren't really invested in making sure the site has a long life. They get paid big money to make a site, they pay out a small amount of money to host it, and so whether it lasts a year or an hour, they've made a profit. The "banker" wants his site to last as long as possible obviously, but doesn't understand the intricacies of hosting/designing a site, so he relies on some greedy sleazeball who doesn't care about longevity to set up the site. The banker never complains that the designer should get a better host; it's always the designer who complains that the banker is giving the site to "unserious people" and that gets it shut down Laughing

Whatever, this is all speculation Wink

Posted: Thu Mar 29, 2007 11:46 am

In my baits I randomly like to kill the email addresses (and of course the domains) of the barristers, bank directors or remittance officers that appear during the bait. Then I complain to the lad why the addresses do not work and slap him. But I always leave the lad's main address intact.

Rule No. 1: Everything the lad has paid for must die.

Eniac

Posted: Thu Mar 29, 2007 12:16 pm

^^^ But why not just tell your lad that the addresses are dead without getting them closed down? He's not to know that you can still mail to them - there are always technical hitches that you can invent.

I hate to say it but what your doing is just as harmful as getting the lad's main account closed. Getting to the barrister stage can take a bit of work for the baiter and if anyone else is baiting those addresses, their work goes down the pan. Sure, they can go back to the original lad, but if he's passed the scam on, it could be dead. "Barristers, lawyers" and the like are pretty far along the bait chain - it's no fun getting a way into the bait only to find that your forms, IDs or whatever (things that you have worked on) are bouncing back and redundant.

As pointed out here, it's also a complete waste of time. Any "barrister" is just going to open up a new account.

Not quite a Newb Joined: 14 Jul 2005 Posts: 41

Eniac wrote:

Rule No. 1: Everything the lad has paid for must die.

@Slightlyoutofit- he isn't talking about free mails, but rather domain addys, such as [email protected]

These, like vanity addy's, are fair game- they cost the lad money when they are closed; the email addresses for fake sites are routinely closed whenever we take down a fake site.

Posted: Thu Mar 29, 2007 2:20 pm

I stand corrected. Embarassed

Carry on soldier.

Posted: Thu Mar 29, 2007 7:31 pm

TSnerd wrote:

Eniac wrote:

Rule No. 1: Everything the lad has paid for must die.

@Slightlyoutofit- he isn't talking about free mails, but rather domain addys, such as [email protected]

The case is a bit different. When a lad comes with a lawyer or banker having free email accouts like [email protected] or [email protected] I'll kill it anyway.

I want to tell you why.

- A real victim may believe such an account is from a real law chamber or a legitimate bank. Therefore it should be treated as a fake bank domain. For example some months ago a lad came with his fake banker with an address like [email protected] . I killed it and slapped him. Next he came with [email protected] and I killed it too. The third time he came with [email protected] Much better, isn't it? That is exactly how a mugu bank email account should look like. I left it alone and continued the bait using other modalities.

- Killing such accounts additionally may cause some work for the lad. This monday I killed [email protected] owned by an escrow vlad impersonating autoscout24.com
The vlad used an elaborate template for his scam mails. After the kill he soon set up a new account ( [email protected] ) but his template was gone. The next two days he wrote his emails text/plain. Of course I'll try to kill the new acoount too.

- Outblaze accounts like accountant.com or diplomats.com are easy targets. It costs me half a minute to file a complaint from my aa419.org account and a hour later the email address is history.

And please @all don't forget what we are doing here. Our primary target is still keeping the lads busy, stealing their time and prevent them from scamming real victims as much as possible. Of course it's nice to have some fun with the mugus. Wink

Eniac

Baiting Guru Joined: 08 Jul 2004 Posts: 11857 Location: UK

^^^^^ Yes, I had forgotten about mail.com accounts, and agree with you that where a lad is using mail.com addies like [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected] etc or any of their other relevant domain addies like those, kill them, victims are very willing to believe what looks like a top level domain name like those!

Posted: Thu Mar 29, 2007 10:12 pm

I'm sorry I missed this discussion. I vote for "good idea" and I'm not going through the rational because Kom did it already and I totally agree with him.

I want to add that the root of the disagreement is in the objectives. This forum is about baits and closing the accounts is bad for baits, period. I could have said what was going to be the result of the poll the second it was posted.
On the other hand, closing the account could save a victim.
Baiting keeps them busy and waste their resources and that's good. Closing the accounts is good too. Both things have been done for a long time and none seems to affect the other. There's always another mail account to close or another mail account to bait.
If the mugu is good doing his job, the bait will go on but maybe the victim will start to suspect something getting so many bounces.
If the mugu is to stupid to have a backup, most likely, is not worth the bait and all his victims will be off the hook.

There's no way to have an agreement because, as I said before, the goals are different, the needs are different. And it get worse when those supporting the BAD side start to feel that the GOOD side is taking this to a moral level. There's no such thing, you have the right to have fun, it's not you duty to save the victims.

You all have to do whatever you feel is right. It's great to have this discussion and allow everyone to explain his position. But we all have to be aware that we're not going to reach an agreement and that this is not a big deal.

I'll keep my position even knowing that it's not going to be easy to close accounts in the future.

Yahoo is not closing them anymore, at least that's what I saw. Not only they're not acknowledging the reports, the accounts stay open.

Gmail is open now to anyone and I saw an increase in the numbers of scammers using it. And Gmail doesn't close accounts unless you can present a solid case with hard evidence certified by a CSI lab.

I don't know if someone gets result reporting to Hotmail. I think my success ratio is way below 50%. Considering that all reports were the same format and the same kind of content, I think that the problem with them is that they don't have a clear policy and all depends on who picks it up.

The small providers fall either side too, some doesn't even read a report, others do but takes some time.

Outblaze is the only one I can say is taking a stand against scammers, they close the accounts even if they're referred on a message from another provider.

That's all I wanted to say. Most of all, to take some pressure out from Komsomol. You can flame me now. I've got the skin of a rhyno...

*** BANNED *** Joined: 02 Jan 2006 Posts: 2021

Well.....im going again with "leave the f*%king accounts alone"
I have spent over a week collecting lads for the 5huttle, i send out and get over 80% bounces, f�$king well done morons, lets give the lads diplomatic immunity why not.
Im not talking a few accounts, im talking thousands of accounts that have suddenly been klilled.
There is people on the net that spend hours collecting these accounts so they can be used to counter attack lads.
Im f*&king embarrased for anyone who thinks they are helping the fight by killing accounts.
Yes, im pissed off Evil or Very Mad

Edit; And just for the record why are those that are stirring up shit here long term members that haven,t posted for years, piss off back to your copy cat sites

419Eater is my life Joined: 30 Nov 2003 Posts: 277

(I wasn't going to reply to this, but I've changed my mind.) It's certainly not nice if someone deliberately harvests the accounts collected by you and your friends for a "counter attack" (as you put it) and reports them for closure, if that is what happened. (I probably don't need to ask whether you have any evidences or at least strong indicators that this is exactly what has happened. I guess you don't, you just suspect that it couldn't have happened otherwise.) If that really how these accounts have been closed, shame on the person who did it: deliberately spoiling someone else's fun is nasty. Please stop doing this.

The only comfort I can offer to you, bombardier, is that this action, despite of its alleged counter-productive and malicious nature, has caused much more damage to the lads than to you. You literally mentioned "thousands of accounts":

bombardier wrote:

Im not talking a few accounts, im talking thousands of accounts that have suddenly been klilled.

It is undisputed that lads spend hours with sending out spam during each run. I've observed several times that it's not unusual for their spam runs to take 3 hours to get compiled (copy&paste the template, copy&paste the email address and possibly the name, send the email). Every email address that you could obtain must have been already exposed by spam, so time must have been spent on it. For simplicity I assume that every account has only been used for just one spam run and I don't take into account that victims may have been in touch with the lads using those acconts, contact to whom may have gotten lost. Calculating with just 2 hours loss per account and instead of "thousands of accounts" let's just take 1,000 accounts, and so at least 2,000 lad hours went down the sink. In comparison, according to your claim ("I have spent over a week collecting lads for the 5huttle") you may have worked 10-20 hours (hopefully not more) on this, 80% of which now seems to have been lost. Consequently the lads have lost at least 125 times to 250 times more than the baiters (in this case represented by your valuable work). That's not that bad, after all.

I hope that helps.

As to your final remark: it's pure gold, signature material.

Not quite a Newb Joined: 14 Jul 2005 Posts: 41

Bombadier, that was uncalled for. I understand that you're hacked about people targeting shuttle addy's, but don't turn that into personal attacks against those who had nothing to do with it.

I may not agree with the views posted by Kom and the others, but they were presented politely and intelligently- they aren't shitstirring.

This is your only warning.

That goes for the rest of the posters in this thread: either present your views in a well-reasoned and polite manner or don't post at all.

Posted: Fri Mar 30, 2007 2:30 pm

Are you assuming that the address posted in the surplus forum are not available anywhere else?
You're trying to claim ownership of those address just because they were posted here. It doesn't make sense. The addresses are all over the net.
And I'm with Komsomol here, harvesting from the forum is not practical. I doubt there's someone doing it.

bombardier wrote:

Edit; And just for the record why are those that are stirring up shit here long term members that haven,t posted for years, piss off back to your copy cat sites

I dind't understand this one. Is it bad to be a long term member? Or is it bad because we don't post often?
Again, the problem is that we have different goals. And not only two sides, I don't agree with Komsomol's vision in many aspects (though I have a lot of respect for him).
And, as a final note, those "long term members" you're talking about have spent a long time doing this, have a lot of experience, have more knowledge and have been effective in hurting lads. They have set a different goal, have pursued it and have succeded. Shouldn't that tell you something? (And I'm not talking about me)

Posted: Fri Mar 30, 2007 3:04 pm

Killing lad accounts does not harm them in any way. It doesn't save potential victims. The lad just opens up another account. That's been repeated many times here and elsewhere.

There is no proof whatsoever that closing lad accounts has a positive effect.
There is proof that baiting these accounts does have a positive effect.

It's a simple as that.

Posted: Fri Mar 30, 2007 3:28 pm

Slightlyoutofit wrote:

There is no proof whatsoever that closing lad accounts has a positive effect.

I'm not claiming that there's proof that closing the accounts has a positive effect. However, if I can present one case of a potential victim who bought the scam and was unable to get into it because the mail bounced, wouldn't it be proof of a positive effect? I know it would be hard to find one, but would you say that there's none?

Slightlyoutofit wrote:

There is proof that baiting these accounts does have a positive effect.

What would you call proof of this? And I'm not taking a complex rational of what you "think" is a consequence of baiting. I understand that they're wasting time and resources (and that's good), but that's not proof that they lay down a real victim to take care of your bait. In fact I'm pretty sure that they can do real jobs and baits at the same time. While they have to work hard to keep you from walking away, the real victim goes with the flow. In the end, if they have to choose, who would be laid down?

Posted: Fri Mar 30, 2007 3:48 pm

You ask for proof?

What about the scammers who have given up scamming because they have been subjected to very good baits? Is that proof enough?

You can find evidence of such occurences within this forum.

Posted: Fri Mar 30, 2007 4:48 pm

Slightlyoutofit wrote:

What about the scammers who have given up scamming because they have been subjected to very good baits? Is that proof enough?

Yes, I know. But that's not the point. Besides the ones mentioned in the forums I'm pretty sure that many scammers quit because they get sick of being baited. The same way I'm pretty sure that many victims still believe they've won the lottery even when they can't contact the payment officer because the mailbox has been closed. But none of this is real evidence.

The scammers that quit because of the baits are (IMHO) weekend warriors. People that can make a living somewhere else.
More scammers are taking this seriously (with or without a real legal decent job) and they won't quit no matter how hard you bait them. Some of them have no other way of life (and I'm not justifying them). Do you really think they'll quit because you bait them? In fact, the good baits are evidence that they don't quit easily.
It's enough for them to get one real victim to stay in the game, you can't control that by baiting. In a way, you're improving the herd by taking down those with none or poor skills to survive.

And finally, you're saying that the scammers abandoned a life of crime but the only thing you've got is their own statement (at least, that's the case of those I remember), the statement of a guy whose way of life is lies and deception. Again, I'm giving you that, I think some really quit because of the baits. But I'm not calling that evidence.

Closing lad accounts - good idea or bad idea?	View next topic View previous topic