Sample Online Scammer Email

Scammers are pretty easy to spot online but I figured I’d throw this up here just as a sample. I received this message on an ehow.com account I have.

I get scammer emails all the time all over the place. I mean the last place I would think I would get one is on ehow? But I also get them when on skype, on yahoo chat, and in my inbox.

Please don’t click on any links received by anyone claiming to be a hot Russian girl or a lonely Russian girl or whatever. Not even if you’re curious.

In the best case scenario it will be someone trying to scam you, in the worst case scenario it will be some Russian hackers trying to install some malware on your computer that could steal your information, spam your contacts, and even use your computer to attack others. As soon as you click that link, your done!

So don’t even be curious. If you’re getting emails from people you never know or contacted then you shouldn’t be opening them up at all, not even out of curiosity (did I say that enough times?).

Here is just one recent message I got on ehow:

Hello my dear.
My name is Faith i saw your profile today and i became interested so please i will like you to email me back through my email address thus:(faith_****@yahoo.com). please i will like you to send me your email address so that i will tell you more about my self and also my picture you to know who i am .hope you understand.thanks.And i will like you to contact me trough my email adress(faith_*****@yahoo.com)
Am waiting to see your lovely reply soonest..
Miss Faith

One last tip:
Because of the threat of hackers/spammers and scammers, I advise you create a separate email account for your interactions with foreign women. A new email account gives various benefits:

#1. It’s an account that isn’t tied to you personally. Your main account may be tied to your bank accounts, work etc. A new account won’t have any of your personal ties, and you can even create it under a fake name.

#2. A new account won’t be in any spammer databases. Spammers and hackers break into computer systems and steal email addresses and sell them in bundles for thousands of dollars in the black market. If you’re email address is older chances are it’s in some sort of spammer databases, which is why new email addresses generally have little to now spam. Creating a new email address will give you months of spam free communication so you don’t have to weed through this crap on a daily basis.

#3. It’s an account you can afford to loose. If you get bored, or you start getting too much spam etc, you can just delete it or not sign back in, you never have to look at it again.

#4. Once you know your dealing with a legitimate foreign girl you give her your real email address if it’s easier for you communicate with her this way. This gives you a funneling process for weeding out all the spam and malicious emails. It’s an added layer of protection.

All this stuff shouldn’t deter you from going out there and trying to meet foreign women. I’m just informing you so that you’re armed with the best information so you are prepared.

“Forewarned, forearmed; to be prepared is half the victory.”
– Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

If you want to get some of the best preparation for meeting foreign women online, abroad, or even on locally, you can grab my entire serious of ebooks for the cost of a good bottle of wine, just CLICK HERE to get more information.

How To Access Your Online Accounts While Traveling Abroad

Accessing your online accounts including banking and email accounts from hotel lobbies and internet cafes can be a good way to get your information stolen. You can never trust other peoples computers, you never really know how good the security at any given location might be. I’ve only gotten my information stolen one time and that was in the Dominican Republic when I used the computer in the hotel lobby.

If you’re planning on traveling and you’ll need to access your online accounts I recommend you take these few precautions just to make sure your information doesn’t get stolen by some keylogger, or some packet sniffing program installed on some foreign network.

Always use an https:// before the intended address. If you need to access your gmail account, use https://www.gmail.com instead of just http://www.gmail.com. The HTTPS means that the connection between the web browser that you’re using and the website you’re accessing will be encrypted, and if anyone happens to capture the network traffic, your information will be safe. But this step doesn’t safeguard you from keyloggers.

There is really no way to defeat a keylogger effectively. The only thing I recommend to be 100% sure your accounts are not compromised is to access your bank accounts only via phone. Most banks have international numbers you can call, but it’s not hard to reach the 1800 customer service numbers from foreign countries. Wherever you are, just ask how to call the United States, or whatever country your from, and they’ll give the codes to dial before you enter the number. In this way you avoid access your banking accounts from an infected computer.

Email is a different story. You won’t be able to access your email via phone, but what I recommend is to set a temporary password before your trip. Use this password while traveling and accessing your email from computers abroad, and then change the password as soon as you get back. If you’re traveling for an extended period of time, I would suggest changing the password every two or three weeks, or every month at the most. Although changing the passwords might seem like hassle, it only takes two minutes and it can give you piece of mind and save you headaches in case you do use a computer that was compromised with keyloggers or trojans.

I would also the the same for chat clients. If you’re going to be accessing chat clients abroad you can use a temporary password while chatting and never share personal information such as account numbers or other important identifiers over chat programs while traveling abroad. As with email you can change your password once you get back home.

Finally, remember to always close all sessions including email and chat. And if you know how to remove cookies or clear private data, do this as well before you leave any computer you might be using.

What if you have your own computer?
If you bring your own laptop, and you run good security on your laptop including a firewall and antivirus, then things will be much safer, all I would suggest then is to access HTTPS urls only.

Using Cell Phones Abroad

I posted an article about using cell phones abroad in the articles section. While the article covers the complete details I wanted to mention the basics here.

When traveling abroad, you want to have a cell phone that will work wherever you’re going. I know most of us don’t have the time to be scouring the web to find out what type of technology is used in the country or region where your traveling to, so the best bet is to either buy a cell phone when you get there, or to get a quad ban, unlocked GSM phone before leaving on your trip. You can get one of these phones easily through ebay, and other related websites.

Once you get to where you’re going, simply buy a SIM chip, put it in your phone, and add some prepaid minutes and you’re all set to go with your new phone! Read my complete article in the articles section of the website for complete details.

Later,

Dan