Becoming a millionaire has never been so easy but there are some spam emails which tempt us to believe so. Here is the recent one from my SPAM trap.
"Hi,
Twenty Millions US Dollars was lodged since 2000 in our bank and the
beneficiary died in 2004 South Asia Tsunami with his family while on holiday in
Thailand.
successful. Now, I want you to stand as next of kin/Beneciary for the fund
release since you have the same Last Name with him, and we will share this
money together, so that I can invest my share in Real Estate in your Country.
address and phone numbers and I will give you all the details.
be disclose to anyone,
Charles"
To completely understand the motives behind such emails first of all we need to understand what the author of such emails can do with the required information i.e. Complete Names, Address and Phone numbers. Well one can use this information to send you spam advertisement either in form of MAIL or SMS. Once can start using your identity for making some frauds etc.
But I guess snatching initial information is just the first step, once someone will reply showing his/her interest in this crafted story they will reply back with more incentives and asking for more information and so on. In subsequent emails they might ask for your SSN or even bank account information to transfer you the money etc.
Atif Mushtaq @ FireEye Malware Intelligence Lab
Question/Comments : research SHIFT-2 fireeye DOT COM
You’ve never heard about 419 scams? They require a “deposit” or “transaction fee” so they can start arrange the transfer. Then there’s another complication and they need a few hundred more to pay for official documentation, etc. In reality of course the 20 mil never existed. (Granted, there’s probably also a second market for the identity information.)