Spammers Send False Messages Relating to Upcoming Football World Cup

Security specialists have alerted that a wave of spam mails relating to the 2010 World Cup is being observed. It could dupe unsuspecting recipients into revealing their banking information. Security company Trend Micro, which detected these e-mails, describes them as falsely telling recipients that they are winners of an Internet lottery relating to the football game scheduled to take place in South Africa.

According to the fraudulent e-mails, the recipients could collect their prize money from their so-called "claim agents" by furnishing their personal details like gender, age, nationality, and contact details.

Furthermore, a typical message in the e-mails says that some high profile entities had sponsored and promoted the particular 'Lottery'. These entities include some MNCs, for example one of Bill Gates, and some European Union governments interested to promote South Africa's 2010 World Cup Award.

Ironically, the false message directs the recipient to keep the "winning information" secret till the time he receives his prize to avoid unwarranted abuse and double claiming. The Trend Micro experts said that the message is a clear instance of social engineering method that the criminals have applied.

The experts also disclosed that the message provides an explanation of the process in which the recipient won the competition that is probably done to lend an element of authenticity. According to them, although it might have corrected spellings, still several clues are there that says it is fake.

Adrian Labiano, anti-spam Research Engineer at Trend Micro, said that spammers are indeed fast in their methods of operating their schemes. According to him, they are already operating a scam in connection with the SA FIFA World Cup that is scheduled to be held at a much later date of one year and six months from now. Webuser reported this on January 15, 2009.

Trend Micro experts also said that if users believe the scam and do as instructed, they will not receive any cash, over and above they might have some of their own stolen. Therefore, users should overlook the fraudulent e-mail.

Related article: Spammers Continue their Campaigns Successfully

» SPAMfighter News - 1/23/2009