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Marco Island Female Receives Scam E-Mail

A Marco Island, Florida woman Lisa Gandy lately got an e-mail that posed as a communication from IRS the American government agency taking care of tax collection as well as tax-law implementation. Marconews.com published this on July 15, 2011.

Appearing as an official message, the e-mail informed Gandy that owing to incomplete information, IRS wasn't able to sort out the returns she filed. The message then directed the reader that she required viewing an attachment followed with dispatching an active identification card (photocopy only) like a social security certificate or driver's license. This made Gandy read the e-mail again more carefully and she found that it contained a logo of the IRS that appeared unclear, while some sentences in it couldn't deliver any sensible meaning.

Gandy said that no sooner she viewed the message she realized it possibly was another scam, published Marconews.com.

Thinking that her friend Keith Dameron could help her, Gandy sent him the e-mail. Incidentally, Dameron had been giving talks on the said type of scams since over 2-yrs.

He studied the e-mail and commented that the particular scam tried to con twice. Nbc-2.compublished this on July 16, 2011.

Dameron said that the first con was in the scammers pretending to be IRS and requesting for the e-mail recipient's information in a given form. Once provided, the information would serve as an additional benefit to them since they got to know the user's details despite him not giving them out. By simply viewing an attachment in the e-mail, a PC-virus was let to compromise that user's PC as also record all keystrokes.

Thus if passwords were typed in, the virus would intercept them which criminals could use for setting up bank accounts, preparing credit cards or applying for mortgages as also loans in the victim's name.

Thus Dameron advises everyone who gets unexpected e-mails, particularly having attachments, to be skeptical, as reputable organizations such as IRS wouldn't ever ask people for filling out their confidential details online. Winknews.com reported this during the 2nd-week of July 2011. Dameron suggests getting in touch with the organization (like IRS here) directly incase the problem is genuine.

Related article: March Witnessed Sharp Rise in Spam

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