Do phishing fraudsters even read what they send?

thenudeone

How can anyone fall for an email like this?

We have recently determined that various computers connect to your Amazon account, password, and the present of chess more taient before the connection. Now we need to confirm the new information from your Amazon account. If not completed within 48 hours, we will be forced to suspend your account indefinitely, because it can be used in a fraudulent intent. Thank you for your comprehension in this way. To confirm your online account: Click Here

ballyblack

They are using a translater

probably don't know any good English

esuhl

The question is... do the victims read the messages...?

Badly worded spam has been around for years, so... I can only assume that it works otherwise the scammers would give up...

Hezzawithkids

Some (or most) email servers can detect open rates. Just the act of opening an email marks you out as a real person/live email addy = a target that can be sold onto other spammers. Which is why the content is usually crap. Suggest that if you don't recognise the sender and/or the subject then just delete without opening (after marking as Junk of course).

bod1467

How do email servers detect "open rates" if you set your email client to block images?

grizzly1911

I am just surprised at the number of "bank" emails I get purporting to be from Banks I have absolutely no connection with. they must be even more stupid than most recipients if they think 2/3 a day isn't going to arouse any sort of suspicion.

I just bin them on site but wish there was away to stop them.

shaun_from_Africa

grizzly1911 wrote: »

they must be even more stupid than most recipients if they think 2/3 a day isn't going to arouse any sort of suspicion.

Even if only one person falls for their scam then they probably don't care how much suspicion is raised by everyone else.
If they send out 100,000 e-mails and only 0.01 of recipients fall for it, that's still 10 bank accounts that the scammers will then have access to.

tronator

Hezzawithkids wrote: »

Some (or most) email servers can detect open rates. Just the act of opening an email marks you out as a real person/live email addy = a target that can be sold onto other spammers. Which is why the content is usually crap. Suggest that if you don't recognise the sender and/or the subject then just delete without opening (after marking as Junk of course).

Which current email clients do open remote content by default? Thunderbird does not, and even Outlook isn't doing it anymore, I think. So opening an email does not harm your system until you open/load the remote content or click a link in the email.

Lum

Phishing fraudsters are cleverer than you think, as are the implausible Nigerian Prince scams.

You have read that message and as a person who is not a complete idiot you have dismissed it out of hand. Only a complete idiot will fall for it.

And that is exactly the sort of person they want. If they write a more plausible sounding scam and people with some intelligence get sucked in, they are then going to waste their time communicating with someone who is going to run a mile as soon as the words "western union" get mentioned.

Far more efficient to weed out these people in the first email by writing something that only an idiot would fall for.

ballyblack

"a fool and their money are easily parted"

and that's the way it should be!

Mr_Toad

thenudeone wrote: »

How can anyone fall for an email like this?

We have recently determined that various computers connect to your Amazon account, password, and the present of chess more taient before the connection. Now we need to confirm the new information from your Amazon account. If not completed within 48 hours, we will be forced to suspend your account indefinitely, because it can be used in a fraudulent intent. Thank you for your comprehension in this way. To confirm your online account: Click Here

It's a numbers game. They send out hundreds of thousands of emails and they only need a few idiots to reply.

It's like those emails promising either a get rich quick scheme or way to enlarge that bit of the anatomy some of the aforementioned idiots think with.

They are usually for small amounts of money and if 1 in a thousand to fall for it at $10 a pop that's $5000 for every 500,000 emails. Not a bad return for something that takes little effort.