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Hackers Attack Author with Fake Email Scam

Douglas Jackson (55), a renowned writer was lately attacked by a cruel electronic hacking fraud, as per the news by stirlingobserver.co.uk on August 26, 2011.

The theft occurred soon after the launch of Jackson's latest book in Edinburgh (UK). The name of the book is The Doomsday Testament.

Family and friends start receiving fake emails seeking financial help after claiming that Jackson was stuck in Spain. The mails stated that Jackson had been robbed in Madrid soon after reaching there and want £1500 immediately for returning back to Scotland.

It is evident that one person has sent money to a fake bank account juts to receive a further email requesting more.

Douglas recommended users to be very careful while submitting private details onto computer site, as per the reports by stirlingobserver.co.uk on August 26, 2011.

He also informed that the attackers had stolen his entire contact lists and after he did a security scan he found that the hackers had kept a Trojan virus that can be used by organized crime groups to steal passwords and has been used in multi-million bank frauds all over the globe.

Sadly, the scam that hit Jackson is known as the "stranded traveler" scam and is a typical variant of 419 Nigerian scam or else known as advance-fee fraud. Security experts explain that for robbing people off their money hackers fabricate a fake story about someone (in this case Jackson) who is stuck somewhere and has lost wallet and who urgently needs financial help. The email seems more authentic when it is sent from the email of someone the potential victims know and that is why the hackers use hacked accounts.

There are many precautions for avoiding such email scams. First of all, have a unique, complicated password. The password should not be simply based on dictionary words. Rather, it should be a mix of upper and lower case letters plus digits and other characters like (!@#$%^&*).

Lastly, don't reveal the password to anyone and stay alert of the email messages that seems to come from the webmail provider.

Related article: Hackers Redirect Windows Live Search to Malicious Sites

» SPAMfighter News - 9/7/2011

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