Posted by Morning Call, Pennsylvania on
You've won $500,000 from the Nigerian brewers' association. Or ''Dr./Mr. Karen Scheck'' has even better news: He's the Nigerian businessman who has a $5 million ATM card with your name on it.
The scam : You've won $500,000 from the Nigerian brewers' association. Or ''Dr./Mr. Karen Scheck'' has even better news: He's the Nigerian businessman who has a $5 million ATM card with your name on it. Or maybe it's the Nigerian ''Office of the senate house of Assembly'' with another ATM card for $500,000. A Mr. Graham Wibert with an e-mail address at live.com also has issued notices to local people offering a ''lottery prize.'' Just reply and provide personal information and the riches are yours.
How it works: You provide a gateway into your bank account when you give out personal information. If you didn't give away personal account information, you will be prompted to wire money to a foreign account.
What to do: Hit the delete button when these e-mails appear in your queue. When in doubt, call the business that is soliciting you. Recognize scams that don't provide a telephone call-back number, and note that the misspellings and grammatical errors suggest sloppiness that would not be acceptable in legitimate businesses. Did you even enter the lottery/sweepstakes? If not, why would someone be offering you its winnings? As always, if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.