A woman in Edmonton lost $1,300 to fraudsters posting as a mystery shopper company.

The company, called Regent Research, posed a consumer research firm, and the applicant was given an assignment. They sent a money order for $1,500, and asked her to wire the $1,300 to a fake cousin in the UK.

By the time the bank discovered that the money order was fake, she has already sent the $1,300 out, and forever lost them to the scam.

The company's web site displayed the Better Business Bureau logo, also fake.

A British web site dealing with scams has published an interview with a convicted scammer.

One of the interesting tactics is to come back after victims who have paid, and posing as law enforcement and ask for a fee to recover the money already paid.

Here is Part 1, and here is Part 2.

And there is a discussion on Slashdot too.

Here is another sad case of a scam working. The victim paid money to the scammers. She also says that she borrowed the money in order to pay the scammers, and is now in double trouble.

The IP address is from Chad. I am not what currency she refers to: Indian Rupees?

Angelique wrote:

I am victim of the scam.

I have deposited R4.915.88, please help me to recover that money.

I have borrowed it. I need to repay it because the people are asking for it.

Here is another case of people confused and lost on the web.

Not only did he mistake my site for the BMW motor company in Germany, but they they have already paid 15,000 Indian Rupees to a scammer who claimed they are representing BMW. Now he is complaining to me thinking that I am BMW.

The reason for confusing my site with BMW's is the BMW 5-series car lottery winning scam article I wrote a while ago.

Here is the message I got:

A cousin of mine got a new laptop from his place of work. The laptop is a nice 14.4" HP with Windows XP on it.

He found that when he visited Facebook, the site looked a bit odd, and when he logged in, the URL was redirecting to various other URLs.

These include:

http://chips05.clanteam.com/

http://chips09.99k.org/pro.php

http://hosint.zymic.com/404/

The following is yet another form of the 419 advance fee fraud emails.

FROM THE DESK OF MANZOOR H. HANIM
LAW CHAMBERS LEGAL
SOLICITORS/PRIVATE LAW
312-345 JALAN AMPANG
KUALA LUMPUR MALAYSIA
PHONE: +60143695081

Attention:

The scammers are pretty brazen and try to convince others that their scams are true.

Here are some examples:

1. A scammer vouches for a scam that he promotes, for example: for the Email fraud: qualifying for the Cadbury Foundation cash aid, he adds a comment saying:

Name: James Arnold
Email: jame.ar@yahoo.com
IP Address: 41.220.75.16
Subject: They are true.

My Friend made his money from this same email, last year.

Here is another scam offering a job of "professional personal assistant" for a fictitious company.

From: Jond Donald
To:
Subject: J&C Electronics Pvt.Ltd

Good day,

We are glad to offer you a job position in our company [J&C Electronics Pvt.Ltd] As part of our Multi Level Marketing Network, we seek capable individuals to work for us as our International representative In Arab such as KUWAIT,UAE,QATAR AND SO ON.

This is one more scam

From: 556565@cadburyfoundation.uk.tt
To: 09cfqc741@cadburyfoundation.co.uk.tt
Subject: Cadbury Foundation Qualification code (09cfqc741)
Date: Wed, 8 Jul 2009 08:37:08 -0500

CADBURY FOUNDATION

Government Buildings,
Otley Road,
Leeds
LS16 5PZ

Date: 07-07-09
Website: www.cadburyfoundation.co.uk.tt
Subject: Notification for Cash Aid

Dear Sir/Madam,

This is to notify you that you have been chosen By the Board of trustees of the Cadbury
Foundation based in the Ireland, as one of the recipients for 2009 Cash Aid for your own

As the scammers get more seasoned, they also become bolder, and more "creative".

Here is a set of emails that were sent to me by various scam attempt recepients.

They claim that they are law enforcement, from Metropolitan Police in the UK, to the FBI, and others.

They all warn the prospective victims of all the scams on the internet and then proceed to vouch for the very scam they have sent earlier to the same person, giving him a false sense of verification and validation.

From: Police Metropolitan