Topic: Beware of this Scam

[Richard Symonds]

Beware of your email account being hacked

I have just received this email from 'Terry Reynolds' and everyone will know he didn't write it, but just in case you get one yourselves from a friend, here is what you have to look at very carefully

How are you doing? This has had to come in a hurry and it has left us in a devastating state. I didn't tell you about my visit to Spain with my family for a short vacation, but unfortunately we were mugged at the hotel where we lodged along with other folks. We didn't bring our phones and the hotel telephone lines were disconnected during the incident. So I have access to only emails. Those thieves made away with our credit cards as well which is why this can't be resolved instantly.

We've been to the Embassy and the Police here but they're not helping issues at all and our flight leaves tomorrow but we're having problems settling outstanding hotel bills and the hotel management won't let us leave until we settle the bills. Please I'm going to need some sort of loan from you for us to settle the hotel bills and also to get another flight ticket.. Please, Let me know if you can help us out? I'm looking forward to hearing from you.

Thanks,
Terry


Now this and Terry's account has to be deleted!

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[Geoff Reid]

The 'Stranded Traveller' Scam.

See: http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/stranded-traveler-scam-hacks-victims-emails-asks-contacts/story?id=16774896

See also: Undelivered package emails - More internet shopping means more viruses, trojan horses and rootkits..

As I said in the above thread:

I think it is likely/obvious that this email has been generated from a p.c which has been infected with a virus/trojan/rootkit which is intended to spread itself to as many machines as possible by means of an small attachment which comes with the email, in this case it was a small (137kb) .zip file   Needless to say, if you receive .zip files attached to emails don't unzip/open them unless you have scanned them and/or know exactly what is contained in the file and what it does

A quick scan of this file with Avast revealed it to be a WIN32 Rootkit generator threat with a severity rating of 'High' and the file was deleted without delay.

Rootkits are the one of the worst types of infestations to have on your machine.  They operate at the operating system services level and once you boot (start) the infected system they may gain privileges which can stop security software from destroying them - often by attaching themselves to system 'restore point' data and mutating and attaching themselves to legitimate operating system services.

Why would anyone open an attachment contained in an email purporting to relate to a package they weren't expecting?  Simple curiosity.  And we know what curiosity did to the cat.

Don't be a cat, be a checker.... 

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[Tobes]

... and use Ubuntu! (I'm a recent and now committed convert!)

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[Morsey]

I had that exact message sent to me a couple of years ago, so it has been doing the rounds for some time. It came via a supposed e-mail from an elderly relative who was in quite a state as all of her contacts received the same message and were concerned. Of course, this now indicates the source from which my computer, at that time, was well and truly ruined. Some right bastards about in this world, with little else to do with their very sad lives.

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