Fakery

It's easy to get used to taking email at face value. Much of spam you see is obviously of no value. However, well designed counterfeit email looks very legitimate. Almost anything about an email message can be faked. Who it's "To:", who it's "From:", where it originated, The "Reply To:" address, etc.

Usually the Subject, To, and From addresses and the content is plausible.

Some worms even generate convincing fake messages automatically. Most of the time there is something slightly "off" about the message. The subject may not match what you'd expect from the sender for example. But some of them will fool you.

["bad" email messages]

You can learn more about rip-offs at the counterfeit email and bogus website pages. You're up against organized criminals and skillful con artists, who know all the tricks of the trade. You'll need to be more astute than they are cunning.

Examples

"Toll free" scams are vicious. A bogus message announces an unclaimed prize, a vacation offer or whatnot. All you need to do to take advantage of it is to call what looks like a toll free number. Trouble is, it's not really a toll-free number. The call goes to an offshore location, and can cost hundreds if not thousands of dollars in just a few minutes.

The "Nigerian" scam is both amusing and a serious ripoff. This and other "419" scams have fleeced victims of more than $150 Million so far. The perpetrator, or at least one perpetrator of this scam was nabbed in Southeast Asia.