Symantec Cautions About Area-Specific Advance-Fee Scams

Researchers at Symantec caution that '419 scams' also called 'advance-fee scams' are doing the rounds in non-English languages that indicates that automatic translation software is being utilized.

Actually, the security company recently blocked one new scam e-mail that attacked Welsh language speakers' niche market located inside Welsh (Wales, UK).

In that, the fraudsters reportedly pretended to be a Kuwaiti ambassador's (for Ivory Coast) widow who seemingly had $2.5m as certain trust deposit, the money, she wanted to distribute amongst the deprived and orphanages, but to carry it out, required assistance from the e-mail recipient, of course, in return of a cut.

Says Symantec that this scam is fascinating in that it is jotted down in Welsh, a dialect that much less than 1m people speak, rather than the story depicted in it.

States Senior malware Operations Engineer Sean Butler at the Cloud Division of Symantec, it isn't likely that the new advance-fee scammer knows the Welsh-language therefore, there's all probability that he first wrote the e-mail in English after which he did a translation into Welsh utilizing a website providing language-translation software. Softpedia.com published this on February 22, 2011.

Moreover, it doesn't seem that the e-mail has been arbitrarily distributed like it normally happens with fraudulent electronic mails written in English rather it's been sent to an inhabitant in Wales, the security company observes.

Worryingly, the above event takes place merely some days since Symantec intercepted a series of e-mails in German-language, which purported to be from an advocate whose client was Hosni Mubarak, the newly-deposed dictator in Egypt. The e-mail asserted that anyone who'd help would get a portion from the funds allegedly deposited within an account of a Belgian banking institution.

Eventually, Symantec states that e-mail scams of the above kind yet again emphasize what's known of 419 scams as capable of continuing to cause considerable annoyance to anybody who doesn't know their nature. Additionally, the scammers of advance-fee fraud are targeting a wide array of targets, while it's also apparent that still more cunning and advanced tricks are being used for defrauding unwitting netizens off their money, the company highlights.

Related article: Sentence for American Contractor for Sabotaging Government Navy Computers

» SPAMfighter News - 3/1/2011