Karavansara

East of Constantinople, West of Shanghai

Tag Archives: mail scams


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This time I’m gonna strike rich!

I just received a mail that promises to solve all my economic problems, and set my writing career on the right path.
No really!
Judge for yourself…

Dear Friend,
An oil business man made a fixed deposit of $26M in my bank branch where I am a director and he died with his entire family in Syria war leaving behind no next of kin. I Propose to present you as next of kin to claim the funds,if interested contact me with your full name, and telephone number to reach you and most importantly, a confirmation of acceptance from you.
Please reply with this Email: xxxxx
Your Truly ,
Ling Lung

Now I’m here preparing a letter for mister Ling Lung.
I think I’ll mention to him that I still have here his grandfather Kai Lung’s wallet. Maybe he’d like to have it back.


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Phishers of Men 2 – The Return

phishing_hThe problem with GoogleTranslate of course is, it can’t handle complex texts.
But let’s proceed with order.

As mentioned in an earlier post, I was contacted by some phishers whose hook letter was so good in terms of content and form, and so riddled with grammar and spelling errors, I offered them my translator services.
Well, they got back at me.
Offering me a translation job.
The cheeky bastards!

And so I was contacted by a noted and well respected American author – whose work I translated in the past – offering me the urgent translation of a 12.000 word document.

And to tell you the truth, the first mail seemed legit.
OK, it came through a gmail.com account and sounded like a template job, but that’s ok – for all I knew, it was a preliminary thing sent to me and a dozen other colleagues…
So I replied, quoting a figure for the translation, proposing a standard contract, and asking for details.
I was sold.
After all, translating stuff is my job – currently, my main paying job:  it is what puts bread on my table and keeps the light on (and the web connection going!)
So, ok, I mailed back my proposal.

And I got a reply! Continue reading →