Lost / Missing package email spoof/scam

[Guest]

Most people  are probably quite familiar with many email scams by now, but this was a new variation on me.

 

I guess they're hoping to catch people expecting parcels from overseas for Christmas presents.

 

It purports to come from the Royal Mail and is titled "Mail - Lost / Missing package - UK Customs and Border Protection"

 

The wording is:

 

"Royal Mail has detained your package for some reason (for example, lack of a proper invoice, bill of sale, or other documentation, a possible trademark violation, or if the package requires a formal entry) the RM International Mail Branch holding it will notify you of the reason for detention (in writing) and how you can get it released.

Please fulfil the documents attached."

 

Needless to say the attachments should not be opened.

 

[ranworthbreeze]

Hello Strowager,

 

I have had dozens of these today, they are after the unwary just like the DHL messages of last week.

 

Regards

Alan

[mbird]

I've had several over the past few days supposedly from Barclays saying my transaction to pay £8000 is finalised and attaching a zip file invoice. Needless to say the attachment has definitely not been opened!

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk HD

[Guest]

Hello Strowager,

 

I have had dozens of these today, they are after the unwary just like the DHL messages of last week.

 

Regards

Alan

 

 

Yes Alan, I was  giving a heads up on here because this "Royal Mail" "Customs" spoof was a new variation, that had only just started yesterday. 

 

I'm still getting them today, about ten, over a number of email accounts, but mostly the business related ones.

[Happy]

I keep getting these e mails, both from the 'Royal Mail' and 'Barclays' and I am so pleased that these threads have been made to prove these are scams.  Alan

[Guest]

There's definitely a sudden increase in parcel related email spoofs.

 

Mailwasher just blocked this one for me:

 

 

The attached message from RoyalMail UK <aqbzttv@k12.ok.us>
was found to contain the virus "Suspect.DoubleExtension-zippwd-15(986cc773bcb0b16b4e49501605311519:67722)".
The infected portion of the message was removed by Virus Blocker.

[donnygeoff]

Now then, all emails are not spam/hacker orientated.

I have received this one today....

 

I'm writing this with tears in my eyes my Family and I came down here to Odessa, Ukraine for a short vacation,unfortunately we were mugged at the park of the hotel where we stayed all cash,credit card and cell were stolen off us but luckily we still have our passports with us.

We've been to the Embassy and the Police here but they're not helping issues at all the bad news is our flight leaves today and I'm having problems settling the hotel bills and the hotel manager won't let us leave until we settle the bills.

Am freaked out at the moment! I will need your help (LOAN) financially. I promise to make the refund once we get back home. Please let me know if you can help?

 

Of course being the generous person I am, I have transferred £2450 to their account with a promise of £3000 paid into my account on their return......

 

[johnb]

We received a number of these last year, but none this.........I am feeling left out...........I hope I didn't upset anyone!

[johnb]

I guess that post won't count towards 50 sensible posts, so I'm posting this in the hope of redressing the balance.

[Bobby]

I had one the other day from somebody wanting to transfer a substantial amount of funds from Zimbabwe and they wanted me to give my bank details so they could use my account for transferring the money. They wanted me to click on a highlighted link to do this.

I sent it to my e mail provider by clicking the "this is spam" button.

I may be past my sell by date but.................!

Bobby.

[ranworthbreeze]

I must have deleted over 500 emails of all of the above dross, it seemed to go in fits and starts, but traffic is getting worse at the moment.

 

Regards

Alan

[loribear]

Ive had a few from paypal, which were spoofs , but i'm not that stupid ,what i really find annoying is the amount of spam emails i get that are offering loans or gambling sites which i never go on, but it's because i'm with gmail, apparently you don't get it with outlook, but because ive got android fone & tablet i have to have a google accout, which i find very annoying. Lori

[jillR]

ive just been watching a program about scammers and

there is a growing group of merry peeps called scam baiters.

one scam baiter who called himself pricky sterling was

 

emailed by a west African who wished to

exchange 10 kilos of gold for the bargain price of £5000.00

so the baiter asked the african to meet him in a far flung

part of cornwall with some gold so that he could test the

authenticity of it, and the scammer made the long expensive journey

all the way from Nigeria to be confronted with a load of

verbal

 

the program was also showing scammers fitting cameras above

 

the keyboard on ATMs ..... I always cover the hand that i

 

type in the pin with, with my other hand and just peep under to

 

type.

 

they also highlighted a case where a scammer phoned and said

 

the persons account had been compromised and asked them to

 

phone the number on the back of their card.

 

the person hung up and dialled the number on the back of his card

 

but the scammer had not hung up and answered the call as if

 

he were the bank and took all the mans details.

[quo vadis]

My Inlaws Eh!!!!

[jillR]

the program showed footage of scammers who were asked to

 

dress up and film themselves dancing to YMCA to please their

 

prospective victim.

 

 

the program also mentioned this site .....

http://www.419eater.com/



 

So what is scambaiting? Well, put simply, you enter into a dialogue with scammers, simply to waste their time and resources. Whilst you are doing this, you will be helping to keep the scammers away from real potential victims and screwing around with the minds of deserving thieves.

It doesn't matter if you are new to this sport or a hardened veteran; if you are wasting the time of a scammer, or frustrating them in any way well that's good enough for us, and we would welcome you to join with our now very large community.

 

[reedham]

Ive had a few from paypal, which were spoofs , but i'm not that stupid ,what i really find annoying is the amount of spam emails i get that are offering loans or gambling sites which i never go on, but it's because i'm with gmail, apparently you don't get it with outlook, but because ive got android fone & tablet i have to have a google accout, which i find very annoying. Lori

 

Odd, I use Google Apps for my personal mail (basically gmail) and get zero spam. If I check my spam folder there's usually hundreds of them but none ever make it through to my inbox. I take it you're just ignoring the spam folder?

[Guest]

...... I take it you're just ignoring the spam folder?

 

 

If so, than that creates another problem, I'm afraid.

 

Spam folders are certainly good for sifting the mail for you, but they should never be relied on as never holding genuine emails.

 

As I mentioned previously on this thread, I prefer to use mailwasher to manually flick quickly through my incoming email headers, (on android phone or PC), then delete the dross, then quickly download the remainder to Outlook or phone.

 

It's then surprising how many genuine emails get sidetracked into my Spam folder, in error.  A high proportion of new contacts and genuine mailshots from businesses I am interested in. If I didn't check it every time, I'd lose out on a lot of important email.

 

The other problem with spam folders on anything other than webmail, is that you also actually download the rubbish and store it on you pc for a period. 

[Ebbtide]

I seem to be favoured by Nigerians. I get these emails with tales of woe. i.e. My father is a political prisoner he has 20 million US Dollars in a bank in London ...................................What a wonderful opportunity lol  It amazes me that there are  people who fall for this. Greed of course.

 

Maurice

[loribear]

ive noticed that if i leave my spam alone for a month that i get about 500 a month , then i just go & delete them all, ive had a look in settings but can't find anything to stop them which is a pain, i wish i could ave a different email but i can't with both my gadgets being android, i wish there was a way around it, but google seem to have the monopoly on android stuff just like apple do with their stuff, but i love my samsung note too much to change , i'm too used the big screen now lol. Lori

[reedham]

ive noticed that if i leave my spam alone for a month that i get about 500 a month , then i just go & delete them all, ive had a look in settings but can't find anything to stop them which is a pain, i wish i could ave a different email but i can't with both my gadgets being android, i wish there was a way around it, but google seem to have the monopoly on android stuff just like apple do with their stuff, but i love my samsung note too much to change , i'm too used the big screen now lol. Lori

 

You can just ignore the spam folder. By default it won't be downloaded to your devices and messages get removed automatically once they're been in there for 30 days. It's really just a fail safe just in case the filters get it wrong however in my experience they're pretty good.

 

I would say that across my 4 mail accounts I get less then 1 false positive every 6 months and probably only a couple of spam messages will make it though in the same period, which with the level of e-mail traffic I get is very impressive.

[Guest]

You can just ignore the spam folder.........

 

.....I would say that across my 4 mail accounts I get less then 1 false positive every 6 months.....

 

I agree that it  automatically maintains itself, deleting any "quarantined" messages after a set period, but I'd still be very reluctant to trust it with not hiding important genuine emails from me.

 

I get many more than 2 false positives per year, and missing those hidden emails would have been quite inconvenient to me. Coincidentally, I've just found a false positive in my outlook spam folder this morning, from a Chinese email seller apologising for not having an ordered item in stock.

 

Agreed, Spam is a damn nuisance, and four fifths of my daily email is spam, around 30 per day.

 

I still prefer to use a program like mailwasher as a quick prelim step to using my main email client software. They do an Android version as well, which I use on my tablet and phone, when roving.

 

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.firetrust.mailwashermobile&hl=en_GB

[SueH]

Hello

 

It appears that this 'I am on holiday' email has started again.  I received one yesterday stating that someone I know was on holiday in 'Kiev, Ukraine'.   It appeared, unfortunately, that his email address had been hacked.  I let him know and he is dealing with it.

 

This is the only one I have received for a while, the span folders on gmail seem to be more efficient than the one I used to have on btinternet.

 

We always delete these straight away, but it obviously works otherwise these people would not send them.  There are some extremely vulnerable people who are being taken in, which is criminal.

 

In fact, imho the whole thing is criminal.  But I haven't heard of any prosecutions!!

 

SueH