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airschooled
Air-Schooled
Joined: April 04, 2012
Posts: 12721
Location: on a bike ride somewhere
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 Posted: Thu Mar 15, 2018 11:33 am Post subject: Bizzare and oddly specific phishing scam |
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Hi folks,
I thought I would post a warning here about a potential scam that I've seen happening…
I run a business that specializes in inspections, appraisals, diagnostics, and teaching of vintage Volkswagens. I received an email from a potential client yesterday:
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Subject: Inquiry
Hello,
I recently inherited some classic and luxury cars from my father. I intend to trade if possible. Your business was recommended to me by my father's friend at his golf club. I need your help in selling these cars because I am not much of a car person. Please get back to me so I can send more pics and details about my inherited cars. I was made to believe classic cars are a good investment and always appreciate in value. Please advice on this.
Thanks.
[full name redacted].
[phone number redacted] |
Sounds oddly formal for my typical clients, but ok. I responded within a few hours with a few paragraphs of details about what I do, and questions regarding his goals as an owner. I was met with this:
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Robbie,
Thanks for getting back to me. I've uploaded a list, pictures and more details of the cars to a shared Google drive for your review.
Link: [u][full name]_Cars_List_Images_Description[/u]
Please get back to me after viewing the files so we can discuss further. Try using another device to open the docs if having difficulty viewing. I would have forwarded directly via email but the files are too large. Also, What's the best time to call?
Best regards,
[full name redacted]
[picture of beautiful '70s 911 attached]
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When I clicked on the link on my phone, I was prompted with a log-in screen that looked like a mid-2000s Google Drive log-in:
Seeing the URL, I entered fake login credentials, that allowed me access to a page that gave me an endless loading screen. Trying on my laptop, my web browser wouldn't load the page, because it was a known phishing site.
Interestingly enough, the phone number voicemail recording (I called from a public phone…) he sent me matched the name of the email address.
Scammers are apparently getting better… Anybody seen one like this before?
Robbie
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EverettB 
Administrator
Joined: April 11, 2000
Posts: 69802
Location: Phoenix Metro
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| Posted: Thu Mar 15, 2018 10:25 pm Post subject: Re: Bizzare and oddly specific phishing scam |
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I have not heard of that one before but I definitely get a lot of random phishing scams for banks and other businesses, almost every day.
I've been getting a bunch of "Facebook has reported a copyright violation on your account" click here to resolve it lately too.
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airschooled
Air-Schooled
Joined: April 04, 2012
Posts: 12721
Location: on a bike ride somewhere
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| Posted: Thu Mar 15, 2018 10:49 pm Post subject: Re: Bizzare and oddly specific phishing scam |
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I get the daily PayPal and amazon account scams, which are generic and comically spelled. PayPal even has a service setup where you forward the offending email to [email protected] and they go after the organization behind it.
This one used my name, and was specifically vintage German car related. The phone I called was a land line, so I’m going to keep calling them from different numbers until I talk to a human...
Robbie
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EverettB
Administrator
Joined: April 11, 2000
Posts: 69802
Location: Phoenix Metro
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| Posted: Thu Mar 15, 2018 10:58 pm Post subject: Re: Bizzare and oddly specific phishing scam |
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Your name is on your ads so maybe they got it from there?
There are warehouses of low-paid scammers in India, etc. that often get very personal these days.
I wonder if Google Drive used to look like that?
It looks similar to some of the Google Image search results I did on "Google Drive"
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inkedlizard
Samba Member
Joined: April 12, 2013
Posts: 34
Location: Los Angeles
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| Posted: Thu Apr 05, 2018 8:03 am Post subject: Re: Bizzare and oddly specific phishing scam |
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| I've experienced the same but mostly on craigslist. To help weed out the fakes I give as much info as possible on the item being sold . If the person asks questions already answered on the ad then most likely its a scam. If you get a question with is "it" or "the" item type of questions without them mentioning the actual item being sold then most likely its a scam. I get calls and they appear on my phone as "scam likely" and I just ignore it. Never click on links sent to you from strangers even if they are potential customers. |
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EverettB
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