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Australians Receive SMS Death Threats

Posted by timothy on from the get-to-the-next-payphone dept.

beaverdownunder writes "Many Aussies across New South Wales and South Australia had a bit of a shock this morning when they received an SMS threatening them with assassination. Although somewhat varied, the messages have typically read, 'Someone paid me to kill you. If you want me to spare you, I'll give you two days to pay $5000. If you inform the police or anybody, you will die, I am monitoring you', and signed with the e-mail address killerking247@yahoo.com. Police and the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission have warned that the messages are almost certainly fake, and that no dialogue should be entered into with scammers." I hope "almost certainly" is droll understatement.

2 of 192 comments (clear)

  1. Australians Receive SMS Death Threats by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    This is a fairly common scam usually received by e-mail. Lot of examples on www.419-eater.com where these types of scammers are known as hitlads.

  2. Re:Seems a very muted response by mrclisdue · · Score: 5, Informative

    Nowadays, Australian law is based on what the USA wants.

    cheers,