How stupid are these phishers...
Phishing: The act of sending an e-mail to a user falsely claiming to be an established legitimate enterprise in an attempt to scam the user into surrendering private information that will be used for identity theft. (courtesy of the Webopedia Computer Dictionary)
So phishing emails arrive all the time. Some are works of art, beautifully crafted to look and feel like they come from the company they claim to, use real URLs throughout except one carefully masked one which is the hook. Many are pretty dire and basically depend on a mix of greed, stupidity and/or an over-trusting nature on the part of the recipient.
I just got one which must be in the running for "stupidest phish of the year"... From the top:
It arrives from a German (.de) email address, claiming to be from the "Microsoft Word Lottery, UK".
The office address is in Liverpool and they are emailing from Germany?
I have of course won £1m and I'm one of 25 lucky "international winne(Addresses) who have won in this category". Just one example of many garbaged bits of English. Oh, and another, which implies its not a £1m prize, actually it's a staggering "GBP 1,000,000.00M"!
Their website is apparently "still under construction, as we are updating our site." A £25+m e-lottery fund without a website?
My email address was selected from their Microsoft Word user lists. Odd, given that like many computer users (most?) I've never actually owned a copy of Microsoft Word...
Then there's the "Non resident claims form" I am required to "completely fill with your correct information". I am a resident...
And my favourite, just for the geeks: my email address was apparently randomly selected by "our new java-based software". Microsoft? Use Java? And tell people about it? Get away...
Just goes to show some phishers are dumber than their victims 
Posted at 01:59PM May 01, 2008 by Chris Puttick in General |