+ RSSHow You Can Spot Email Scams
Most of us get spam trying to sell us things, most commonly prescriptions, cheap mortgage rates, online gambling and other, more "adult" topics. Most of us just delete them or hit the "spam" button and move on. There are some other types of spam that are a little more serious, however.
One of the most common ones has been around for many years - the Nigerian bank scam. The person sending the email pretends to be the wife, brother, lawyer, banker or have some other relationship with some kind of government official in Nigeria. They tell the sad story of money that was deposited in a bank account but can't be accessed because the person has died. They offer to give you a share of the wealth in return for accepting a transfer of the money to your bank account. The catch is, you need to give them your bank account information and transfer several thousand dollars to them first for "expenses". Naturally, you never see any of the money that is promised after sending the expense funds. It sounds obvious, but people fall for this scam year after year, even though it has been going on for so long.
Some Internet scams offer investment opportunities with huge paybacks. They usually claim to be risk-free, but once they have your money, you're very unlikely to see any return. Another common scam involves offering credit cards for those with bad credit ratings - just send a security deposit and processing fees. In return you get - that's right - nothing. And by the time you start to investigate, the scam artist has disappeared.
These scams can also effect legitimate businesses you might be dealing with. Because there is so much spam these days, the email services are working hard to filter it out. These filters can sometimes stop legitimate messages, however, and you may not receive something you wanted.
How To Avoid Getting Scammed
Never reply to spam. Doing so simply indicates to the spammer that your e-mail address is valid, and you'll receive more spam than before. Some spam contains a message offering to remove your e-mail address from their mailing list. Don't use even this service - it's nothing but another method for verifying e-mail addresses.
And above all else, never give any private information like credit card numbers or bank account information via email. Companies like Paypal or your bank will never ask for your username and password in an email message.
How do you know whether it's spam? Since, one man's spam is sometimes another's welcomed advertisement, there's no perfect answer. But there is one good rule of thumb: if you don't recognize the sender, it's probably not someone you want to hear from. After all, how many former dictators in Nigeria are you likely to know?
