There are many spam ads trying to sell you prescription drugs, home refinance offers, and emails trying to get you to sign up for online casinos; these are just annoying. But there are many other email scams whose main goal is to take your money, all if they can.
The Nigerian bank scam is a famous example of this. The sender, who says he is related to a government official or a former Nigerian dictator, tells a story in the email of how millions of dollars are in the bank and inaccessible. They are willing to share the jackpot with you, if you are willing to help them. However, your help requires the transfer of several thousand dollars from your own bank account. While it seems that most of us would be too smart to fall for this scam, the reality is that many people fall in love with it every year. An elderly Czech man who put his life savings through this scam shot the Nigerian consul in a highly publicized example of how this scam can be devastating.
Some of the more common internet scams offer you almost incredible investment schemes with returns that are too good to believe and too good to be true. These investment schemes usually claim to be risk-free, but once you hand over your money, it is highly unlikely that you will get a payback. A common scam targets people with bad credit. This asks you to send money for processing fees and a security deposit and you get a credit card. You won’t get anything for your money, and by the time you start getting help or an investigation, the scammer is gone.
Another common scam involves multi-level marketing schemes (commonly known as MLM). These emails will suggest that you buy large quantities of some trendy product. They tell you that you can resell the product for an easy and lucrative profit. You will receive a commission for each sale you make and the sales made by others who work under your direction. However, once you have purchased the merchandise, your dealer will disappear and usually won’t even deliver the merchandise.
It is important to remember that legitimate companies do not advertise in this way. They will typically email select groups, people who have previously purchased products from them, or who have signed up and given their email address. Often these emails will be addressed to you personally rather than through a generic bulk email. Any other offers should be ignored and you can simply delete the emails or click “spam” in your email client to let the server know they came from a spammer.
One lesson people must learn is never to reply to a spammer. Even if you reply with “stop emailing me”, that email will not be read and you will simply receive more emails instead. Don’t even click on the link that says “click here to remove your email from our email list”; it will not be removed from the email list and will be added back to your database.
Lastly, never give your personal bank account information, private data, or your credit card number to anyone on the Internet that you don’t know. Banks, PayPal, and other credible companies will never send you an email requesting passwords or other personal information.
It is another common scam for you to receive an email from a “bank” requesting your password or other personal information. You will be informed that the information is necessary to confirm your account. Please do not click on these emails. If you wonder if they are real, you can always call the bank directly.
Most of these scams are obvious. And you can tell by looking at them that your spam is certainly not on the rise, but if you’re not sure, always look at who the sender is. If you don’t recognize the sender’s name, the email is likely spam.
