Best Email Ev-Ar...

[TazManiac]

Well, not exactly, but it gets points on some kind of scale for sheer audacity and heartfelt hand-wringing...
Note: other than munging the embedded email address, no attempts at spelling, grammar and or syntax correction have been attempted...
-------------------------------------

Dearest One,

How are you today, I hope my mail meet you in good condition of
health? Dear I have decided to contact you after much thought
considering the fact that we have not meet before, but because of some
circumstance obliged me, I decided to contact you due to the urgency
of my present situation here in the refugee camp for your rescue and
also for a business venture/project which I need your assistant in
this business establishment in your country as my foreign partner as
well as my legal appointed trustee.I am Aisha Muammar Gaddafi, the
only daughter of the embattled president of Libya, Hon. Muammar
Gaddafi. I am currently residing in Burkina Faso unfortunately as a
refugee. I am writing this mail with tears and sorrow from my heart
asking for your urgent help. I have passed through pains and sorrowful
moment since the death of my late father.

At the meantime, my family is the target of Western nations led by
Nato who wants to destroy my father at all costs. Our investments and
bank accounts in several countries are their targets to freeze. My
Father of blessed memory deposited the sum of $17.2M (Seventeen
Million, Two Hundred Thousand Dollars) in (ADB) Africa development
Bank Burkina Faso which he used my name as the next of kin. I have
been commissioned by the (ADB ) Bank to present an interested foreign
investor/partner who can stand as my trustee and receive the fund in
his account for a possible investment in his country due to my refugee
status here in Burkina Faso.I am in search of an honest and reliable
person who will help me and stand as my trustee so that I will present
him to the Bank for the transfer of the fund to his bank account
overseas.

I have chosen to contact you after my prayers and I believe that you
will not betray my trust. But rather take me as your own sister or
daughter. If this transaction interest you, you don't have to disclose
it to anybody because of what is going with my entire family, if the
united nation happens to know this account, they will freezing it as
they froze others, so please keep this transaction only to yourself
until we finalize it.Apologetic for my pictures I will enclose it in
my next mail and more about me when I hear from you okay. Thanks and
Best Regards,

Please you can contact me here in my private email( aish <munged-up address> oo.com
) for security purpose.

Yours Sincerely.

Aisha Gaddafi

[lake_wrangler]

I wish I could find it again... I saw a website, once, that told stories of people who actually replied to such emails, but with the intent of scamming the scammers. It was epic!

[Alkarii]

I once had the idea to tell them I can't do anything, because the FBI (or someone) has been tailing me.

[lake_wrangler]

In one of the stories I read on that website I mentioned, the guy actually got the scammer to send HIM money (somewhere around either $80 or $150, on one occasion, and somewhat more, on a second occasion.) He even got the scammer to use a marker and draw some shape on his chest, and have himself photographed that way, to "prove" his adherence to some "church", before the guy could send the scammer any money...

I wish I could remember the website's address...

[Atomic]

And then there's the fellow who had the scammers do the Parrot Sketch to prove .... ah, something....

[Sgt. Howard]

I wish I could have gotten a further response from the one where I told the person...

"I would love to help you in this matter, but as it is I am currently deceased. My Solicitor, (here I inserted the name and address of my ex-wife's attorney), is acting as the executor of my estate, which includes approximately forty acres of downtown Seattle. If you send a cashier's cheque for the amount of 54,00 pounds sterling in my name to this PO box, I will happily transfer ownership to you- the fee is to cover the bank fees and overseas transfer- the honorable (XXXXXXX may his bones burn bright green for all eternity) Esquire will happily officiate the transfer.
Thank you for your time,
Gregory F. (the old Sgt. ) Howard

[lake_wrangler]

And then there's the fellow who had the scammers do the Parrot Sketch to prove .... ah, something....

Thank you! In the video description, there was a link to the website I was talking about: http://www.419eaters.com

And the story I was referring to earlier was this one:

The Tale of The Painted Breast

[ElLibro]

So I guess it's just an updated version of 419 scam aka "Nigerian prince" scam... I wonder who's falling for scams like that

[Dave]

So I guess it's just an updated version of 419 scam aka "Nigerian prince" scam... I wonder who's falling for scams like that

A depressing number of people do fall for these scams... the classic "Spanish Prisoner" and all of its more recent "advance fee" frauds. The "hit rate" for these advance-fee scams isn't very high... but it's so cheap to send out emails that even getting one "nibble" per 10,000 emails sent can be very profitable.

From what I've read, the typical "mark" for this sort of scam is not very well educated, is fairly naive, and often elderly. They're the same sort of people who are attractive targets for "psychic" and "spiritual" scammers (e.g "Maria Duval"), in-person confidence tricksters, recruitment-driven "multi-level marketing" scams, "sweepstakes" scams, and "high rate of return guaranteed" Ponzi schemes (and state-run lotteries, most of which have a return rate of about 50%).

The real winners are not necessarily the email scammers themselves, though. From what I've heard, a lot of the money being made in these scams goes to the "scam teachers" - people who sell a "how to make money on the Internet" training (often in impoverished third-world countries) and teach other, Internet-naive people how to write a chain letter and run software which "mines" the net for email addresses and send out emails. They'll often sell the software as part of their "training" or "service".

What they don't tell their students is that the same trick has been tried about 100,000 times before, that most people who use the Internet are aware of it and won't "bite", and that the chance of their managing to scam anyone out of the cost of the "training and software" package is quite poor.

So, the people learning how to scam, are themselves being scammed.

[Warrl]

(and state-run lotteries, most of which have a return rate of about 50%)

This is not true. The truth is worse.

Out of a dollar spent on a ticket, typically the store where it's purchased gets to keep around 40 cents. And of the remaining 60 cents, about 60% - 36 cents - goes to prize money.

Yep, the payout is only about 36% on the gross bet.

You're better off going to Vegas and gambling at a casino. By law, something like 90% of the gross bet has to go back to the gamblers.

[TazManiac]

I was just really glad to be addressed 'Dearest One'...

[Dave]

Yep, the payout is only about 36% on the gross bet.

You're better off going to Vegas and gambling at a casino.

Ouch. Didn't realize it was that bad in some places.

An article here shows that it varies a great deal by state. In some states, the payout seems to be as much as 2/3, and in most states it's at least half.

In five states, it's far worse, and three of these states are among the four "highest lottery spending per capita". I can't see why anybody would want to play the lottery in West Virginia, for example.

As to the store getting 40% of the sale price... not here in California! Retailer commissions are in the range of 5-6% for ticket sales, another 1-3% for cashing a winning ticket, and a half-percent-of-the-prize bonus if they sell a winning draw ticket.

I was just really glad to be addressed 'Dearest One'...

It's a typo. They really meant to say "Deer-est one", as in "come over here, lick the salt, and I'll shoot you for my supper."

[Typeminer]

George Will once observed that lotteries are a tax on stupidity. I acknowledge a good line when I steal it, whatever my opinion of the source.

[lake_wrangler]

Having had time to reflect on it, I think I too, received a similar email from Ms Qaddafi, a while back... Email which got deleted right away, of course...

[ShneekeyTheLost]

For some reason, I never get these types of emails, however I do occasionally get amusing phone calls.

There's one claiming to be a Microsoft employee (I don't run any Windows products, mind you, I've been penguin for almost a decade now) advising me that the latest 'supervirus' that was just discovered a few hours ago is particularly insidious and they need to take remote control over my computer so they can ensure that it is clean. This is, of course, an attempt to get them access to your computer to either make it part of their bot army or mine any sensitive data on your computer.

That was a rather amusing call, well worth the ten minutes. It ended with 'however, I'm not aware of any Microsoft facilities which exist in your location"

"I am to be assuring you..."

"Oh no, not the one your black-box is attempting to make my hardware believe it is, I'm talking about your actual location. It's taken me a few minutes longer than usual to trace, good job by the way, but unfortunately bouncing it off a satellite actually makes you easier to track once I compromise the government override to pinpoint your location, in longitude and latitude, down to the square meter'

At that point, the call disconnected. Wonder why? After all, if he was going to BS me, I was going to return the favor. It's not my fault if he believed me.

Other lines I use to end such calls include:

"But I wasn't aware <supposed company they work for? had a facility in <city related to the area code dialing in>"
It takes me almost no time and a google search, and it also tells me if they are on a burner phone or if they are simply using a bogus number. Which lines me up for the response to their smug denial with

"No, of course not, but that's where you purchased the burner phone you are on, wasn't it? Unfortunately, the fact that you are on a burner means you aren't a legitimate representative. Oh, by the way, did you know the Feds can track the GPS chip in even 'burner' phones? And can't be disabled? I'd say you have fifteen minutes tops before you have an unpleasant day."

It's reasonable enough technobabble that the common ignorant scammer is going to fall for it, particularly because most of them are paranoid about being caught in the first place and it caters to their paranoia.

"Starting off a response to any scam call call with "By law, I am required to advise you that this call is being recorded and may be actively monitored for quality control." is always good for a hoot.

[Alkarii]

You could also answer and pretend to be a cop, who answered a phone they found at a crime scene, with the owner of that phone being either the victim, or a suspect who dropped the phone.

[Warrl]

There's one claiming to be a Microsoft employee (I don't run any Windows products, mind you, I've been penguin for almost a decade now) advising me that the latest 'supervirus' that was just discovered a few hours ago is particularly insidious and they need to take remote control over my computer so they can ensure that it is clean. This is, of course, an attempt to get them access to your computer to either make it part of their bot army or mine any sensitive data on your computer.

I wish I could get Windows running in a virtual machine, just for this purpose... but I don't have a fresh-install disk of any version. (I do have a couple of upgrade disks, but that doesn't do it. At least, not when running VirtualBox under Linux.)

[TazManiac]

There's one claiming to be a Microsoft employee (I don't run any Windows products, mind you, I've been penguin for almost a decade now) advising me that the latest 'supervirus' that was just discovered a few hours ago is particularly insidious and they need to take remote control over my computer so they can ensure that it is clean. This is, of course, an attempt to get them access to your computer to either make it part of their bot army or mine any sensitive data on your computer.

I wish I could get Windows running in a virtual machine, just for this purpose... but I don't have a fresh-install disk of any version. (I do have a couple of upgrade disks, but that doesn't do it. At least, not when running VirtualBox under Linux.)

Warri, I can send you link, a legitimate source, but hows your download capabilities? Can you deal w/ a multi-Gig d/l without negative ramifications?

[Warrl]

Warri, I can send you link, a legitimate source, but hows your download capabilities? Can you deal w/ a multi-Gig d/l without negative ramifications?

Well, my link through the RV park's wifi is slow and unstable... in fact at the moment I'm bypassing it and going through the cell-phone network, where I'm metered... but I do have a download manager that knows how to resume a download.

[TazManiac]

OK, Today is a Travel Day for me, but I'll be sending a PM before too long...