Why be paranoid? Well, I recently received an obvious scam spam type email from a geezer in Malaysia. The old "I have a client who needs an account in Britain to transfer millions of quids into etc". Well you naturally think, “oh yeah, sounds fair enough to me, I'll send him all my banking details” - like hell I will!
What bothered me though was the phrase, "I recently saw your contact and profile". Now I had recently been signing up with websites to try and get a job. It made me wonder, from where did Karl etc. obtain my details? If he got the details from a website that guaranteed confidentiality, where does that leave me?
The rest of the e-mail was just downright funny. He had a client in Malaysia, now deceased, with the same surname as myself (my kind self - according to him). His proposal was that we shift the cash into my bank account and share the proceeds 60/40.
How obvious is that for a kick-off? Millions of bucks for nothing - don't think so somehow. Oh and he wanted my honest cooperation - my honest cooperation in carrying out a fraud - ye Gods, what does he think I am - a complete idiot?
So, if you receive an e-mail of a similar nature, ask yourself - does this sound too good to be true? If it does, then it probably is. Another question, how likely is it that recently deceased millionaires from Malaysia share the same surname as hundreds of people in Britain? The odds against it are absolutely astronomical!
