419 Scammers enter uncharted territory: Your LinkedIn profile now at risk!
Photo by: Mario Sundar
Security experts working at Sophos, a security firm, have issued a warning to the online community in general that internet fraudsters may now be training their eyes on the professional networking site LinkedIn for their new victims. Until now, this was uncharted territory for scammers. But security pros working at Sophos invited attention to an email pleading all at LinkedIn to help by surrendering with personal banking related information.
The email, presumably from a 22 year old woman in Ivory Coast, spells out the dire circumstances that have befallen her. On his deathbed, her father revealed he was leaving all of $6.5 Million for her, which he also claimed was the cause of his sudden death.
You’d love reading her intriguing sob story:
Dearest One…
Sorry for the nature of this email, please bear with me.
I am Natasha Kone, a 22 year old lady now, i was born on the 1st of January 1986 to the family of Kone. My father’s name is Kamara Cone. He was a very wealthy Gold and Cocoa Merchant based in ACCRA and ABIDJAN respectively. I am their only child. When I was a kid, I attended a private school and things were well for me and my parents. Things changed when I was in High School, my mother died on the 21st October 1994. My father then took me very special and gave me motherly care. As fate had it, my father died last year.
Before the death of my father on the 12th December 2007, in a private hospital here in Abidjan, he called me secretly to his bed side and told me that he kept a sum of $6.500 000 (six million five hundred thousand United States Dollars) in a bank in Abidjan Cote D’ivoire. He used my name as the next of kin in deposit of the fund. He also explained to me that it was because of this money he was poisoned by his business partner and that i should seek for foreign partner in a country of my choice where i would transfer this money and use it for investment purpose.
The letter says her father forbid her from withdrawing the money from there. So, here she was, looking up to you to bail her out of her present crisis by allowing the use of your personal bank account in order to transfer the funds. Of course, you will be properly compensated for your efforts with a percentage of the funds. All you will have to do is to email her your bank account number, name and address.
Little will you suspect that there is only a hairy fraudster at the other end who desperately wants your banking information in order to clean your account off money.
Graham Cluley, senior technology consultant at Sophos has a word of advice against the scammers:
“LinkedIn provides the ability to prevent people from sending you an invitation to connect unless they know your email address or appear in your ‘other contacts’ list. That should cut out a lot of the junk mail arriving at your LinkedIn account. Other options can reduce the amount of spam you receive at LinkedIn even further.”
Amen to that. Let the fraudsters rot in hell…
Source: Sophos.com
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December 2nd, 2008 at 2:11 pm
I have offeten wondered why just anyone who has are account information can clean out our accounts with out a reason. Shouldn’t their be a rule that states that the account can not be closed for X amount of days and a check must be issued to the person. and if your wiring money shouldn’t the banks notice large amounts comming in to the bank. I thought anything over 2000 was reportable how can people completely close accounts without anyone noticing. Shouldn’t banks have some resopnsablity for the peoples losses.
March 7th, 2009 at 5:54 pm
I just can’t believe anyone would respond to this!
March 7th, 2009 at 5:58 pm
I once had a guy call and say I had won a new car from some Quebec Lottery. All I had to do was send 2500. to cover costs and it would be delivered right away. WOW!!!!
Anyway I told him to cover the costs and deliver it. If he did that I would pay him the costs plus 5000. in cash.
Sorry to say that I never got the car.
LOL