New Online Scam...
Offline, on your PHONE!

I find it interesting that during my tenure at the Beaumont Enterprise, I would feed story ideas with documenting evidence to the editorial department on numerous occasions. Occasionally, a story would be centered around emerging technologies and/or technological fraud.

One of the many examples I can bring to mind is that of the English Bulldog scam. I, like most of my Enterprise constituents, had our email addresses listed prominently on the BeaumontEnterprise.com website. Being a popular online destination, enjoying high Google search engine dominance, Enterprise employees are inundated with high-quality junk mail everyday.

You may ask yourself why a company of such magnitude (it is a Hearst corporation company) would fail at filtering crap emails, and I would say that they did seem to manage to catch the majority of porn. I simply received offers to enlarge my manhood, apply for lucrative sales jobs, can receive a windfall from a Nigerian diplomat, and interesting classified ads. Among these was an ad requesting to place a classified ad for an adorable English Bulldog puppy.

The email supplied only a name (presumably fake), email address (which the 'respond to' address and the 'classified contact' email address were never the same), and puppy descriptions. Look it up.

http://www.champbulldogs.com/scam.htm
http://www.aarp.org/bulletin/consumer/scam_alert_canine_con.html
http://www.scambusters.org/puppyscams.html
http://blogs.orlandosentinel.com/features_lifestyle_animal/2006/10/bulldog_scam_pr.html

My point is simply this.

Recently, I have moved into the online world as has my roommate. I am quite aware that several sites may make my phone number (such as a website address registering site like GoDaddy.com) available because it is public information.

I have been receiving strange phone calls from "telemarketing" firms with recorded messages, blocked phone numbers, and/or nonreturnable phone numbers (faked). I am under the understanding that it is possible to display a fake phone number to caller ID systems so the caller is led to believe the call originates from a particular region in the U.S. (This may be possible in other countries but I live in a bubble.... not literally, though). With a system setup like this, the caller could be ANYWHERE there is a high-speed connection (and the U.S. DOES NOT have the fastest internet connection) and can call both home AND cell! Freaky, huh?

The benefit of doing something like this would quite obviously to lead unsuspecting people to give out their personal information to a supposed "trusted" source. Instead of an obvious con, I believe, it must be quite easier to get financial information from someone for a product or service than it would be using the 'now old' Nigerian diplomat money transfer scam.

http://www.peoples-law.org/consumer/scams/nigeria.htm
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3078489/
http://www.fraudaid.com/ScamSpeak/Nigerian/I'veReceivedaNigerianLetter-WhatDo-I-Do.htm
http://www.crimes-of-persuasion.com/Nigerian/asset_transfers.htm

Criminals are patient people. The really smart ones realize they may need days, weeks, months, or even years to successfully pull off a grand scam. Working telemarketers may not even know they are being used as pawns to obtain sensitive information like address, phone numbers, and credit card numbers. To what ends they can use this information, I'm unsure of. All I know is that in the wrong hands, this information can be quite lucrative.

The thing that worries me the most is that in the world of an almost global economy, it will continually seem easier to pretend to be someone from somewhere else residing somewhere new that no one knows. I hope that makes sense.

In closing, be vigilant in all you do. The mail can be exploited. Our phone lines are not perfect and are only as good as the flow of data they receive. In this millennium, con artist don't even need to go through your garbage. They can just give you a call and be as friendly as possible. "Thank you very much for your order, and you should be receiving it soon." And then you wonder why the number they called you from says 'This number does not exist. Try your call again,' when you try and redial it.

Oops.