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SCO Nigerian Spam
An anonymous reader writes "This Nigerian/SCO spam email (courtesy of Ars Technica) has been doing the rounds recently." With all the SCO news lately, it's nice to see something with a bit of humor in it.
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Don't laugh. Some people fall for it and pay. My aunt was caught up in a nigerian scam (running out of the netherlands in reality) and lost her initial $5k 'investment'
People don't use their brains when they're on the net. If it comes in email they believe it.
I should have asked her for $5k myself. I probably would have worked it out of her in days, and it could bay for the damned free tech support she expects from me.
I teach nights at a local college. On no fewer then 3 occasions in the last year I have had students check their e-mail during lab, call me over, show me the Nigerian scam, and then ask me "Is this legit? Do you think I should do it?"
Each time I've responded with "You're kidding right?"
And each time I've been given back a look that tells me that no they're not kidding.
I am then forced to weep for the future.
The whole point of a Nigerian scam is that the victim thinks that they're getting on the inside of some crooked scheme.
As I noted in a message at the top of this story, my aunt lost $5000 to scammers. She STILL thinks that if the police hadn't intervened she'd have her money back, with her profits. Her trust was earned, and they still have it unfortunately.