more sodding spam...

[jazzdevil]

how do

forgive the post count - i'm more of a reader than a poster so far... that said i was suprised to land the following as a pm to me today -

Dear Child of God
Calvary greetings in the name of our lord and personal saviour amen.
My name is Mrs Monica Usawh ,from Cote D' Ivoire .I am married to late Mr Ronie Usawh, who worked as a senior manager with the Ivory Coast refinary for Twenty-Six years before he died in the year 2005,after a brief illness that lasted for only five days.
We were married for Eighteen years with a son (Roger) who later died in a motor accident. Before the untimely death of my husband,we were both born again Christians. Since after his death I decided not to remarry due to often ill health . When my late husband was alive he deposited the sum of one Million,three hundred Thousand United States Dollars (US$1.3m) in a General Trust Account with a prime bank in Abidjan Cote d'Ivoire. Presently,this money is still with the bank.
Recently,Following my ill health, my Doctor told me that I may not last long due to my cancer problem.The one that disturbs me most is my stroke sickness.Having known my condition I decided to donate this fund to someone that will utilize this money the way I am going to instruct herein,according to the desire of my late husband before his death.
I want this fund to be used in Christain Activities like,Orphanages, Christain schools, and Churches for propagating the word of God and to endeavor that the house of God is maintained. The Bible made us to understand that "Blessed is the hand that giveth". I took this decision because I don't have any child that will inherit this money and my husband relatives are not Christians and I don't want my husband's efforts to be used by unbelievers. I don't want a situation where this money will be used in an ungodly way. This is why I am taking this decision.
I am not afraid of death hence I know where I am going. I know that I am going to be in the bosom of the Lord. Exodus 14 VS 14 says that "the lord will fight my case and I shall hold my peace". I don't need any telephone communication in this regard because of my health hence the presence of my husband's relatives around me always.I don't want them to know about this development.With God all things are possible.
As soon as I receive your reply I shall give you the contact of the bank in Abidjan. I will also issue you the documents that will prove you the present beneficiary of this fund. I want you and the Church to always pray for me because the lord is my shephard. My happiness is that I lived a life of a worthy Christian. Whoever that Wants to serve the Lord must serve him in spirit and
Truth. Please always be prayerful all through your life.
Contact me on this email address (musawh@yahoo.com) as any delay in your reply will give me room in sourcing another person for this same purpose.
Please assure me that you will act accordingly as I Stated herein. Hoping to receive your reply.
Remain blessed in the Lord.
Yours in Christ,
Mrs Monica Usawh.

will a MOD please put this joker 'sawh' out onto Detonation Boulevard.

thanking you.

[James Blast]

Y'uh ain't from roun' heah, are ya son...?

[jazzdevil]

...call me a 'late developer'

i get this kinda junk through my email account, hell even my Face-ache account... just suprised by it making it to me as a pm via a Forum.

[James Blast]

well I'm basking in a Carribbean paradise thanks to the £305,647,077 my very good friend (in Christ) Mrs. "Memh Baba" Dr. Makaba Miriam forwarded to my account, may Gawd bless her big wobbly ass!

edit:
it was only £305,647.77, the bitch

[Pat]

Looks like more people are getting this,I feel so left out.
@ Jazzdevil crackin' signature.

[stufarq]

I got this too. For anyone who doesn't know, it's a variation on the Nigerian/West African/419 fraud scam. DON'T UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES REPLY TO IT. Here's an extract from what the Met has to say about it. The full story can be found at http://www.met.police.uk/fraudalert/419.htm

"Advance fee fraud or '419' fraud (named after the relevant section of the Nigerian Criminal Code) is a popular crime with the West African organised criminal networks. There are a myriad of schemes and scams - mail, faxed and telephone promises designed to facilitate victims parting with money. All involve requests to help move large sums of money with the promise of a substantial share of the cash in return.

This type of scam, originally known as the "Spanish Prisoner Letter", has been carried out since at least the sixteenth century via ordinary postal mail. These scams have come to be associated in the public mind with Nigeria due to the massive proliferation of such confidence tricks from that country since the mid-eighties, although they are often also carried out in other African nations, and increasingly from European cities with large Nigerian populations, notably London and Amsterdam.

Victim's individual monetary losses can range from the low thousands into multi-millions. True figures are often impossible to ascertain, because many victims, embarrassed by their naiveté and feeling personally humiliated, do not report the crime to the authorities. Others, having lost so much themselves, become "part of the gang" recruiting more victims from their own country of residence. There are tragic cases of victims being unable to cope with the losses and committing suicide.

The letters are often littered with spelling mistakes and bad grammar. This is a deliberate ploy by the fraudsters to induce the potential victim to believe that he is dealing with uneducated people who would not have the ability to defraud him/her. Nothing could be further from the truth! The majority of victims prove to be professional business people, doctors and lawyers.

The scam is so simple that it can be stated to be "please help me spirit US $35 million from Nigeria through your bank account and I will give you about US $10 million for your mere participation!"

Those who contact the fraudsters are about to participate in a "hurdle" race with each hurdle increasing in size as the victim is thwarted each time he is close to the end. By the time the victim has overcome all the hurdles he is in such a state of involvement that he is practically throwing his money at the fraudsters just to finish the course.

At the heart of the scam is the advanced fee aspect. This means that just when the money is about to be transferred some unforeseen difficulty suddenly occurs and fees from the victim are necessary to overcome the problem. There can be a variety of fees sought: a bribe to a Government Official, local attorney fees, VAT, insurance, National Economy recovery fund, customs clearance - the list and invention is immense.

Victims are often encouraged to travel to Nigeria to complete transactions; some do and eventually arrive penniless at their own embassies in Lagos with a long tale of woe. Mostly they will be asked to travel to a neutral country where the "official" handover can take place. London has long been the favourite venue for this, however in recent times South Africa and Spain have become popular. Victims from the United Kingdom are invariably taken abroad. Violence has not been a factor in commission of these frauds in London however victims travelling to South Africa have been subjected to violent assaults, robbery and in one case, murder."

Perhaps the Mods should send a general message to everyone on the board warning them about these mails.

[James Blast]

this really isn't new or news, oh and thanks for the blue type, it looks mindblowing in Dr. Jeep

[weebleswobble]

I want that kind of attention!

[6FeetOver]

this really isn't new or news

Precisely. What 'net denizen hasn't been exposed to this nonsense, by now? I mean, it's 2008, ffs, folks! I don't mean to trivialize the issue, but I'm truly shocked that there are Internet users out there who apparently haven't seen this kind of thing and learned to deal with it appropriately...

[Dark]

If it's still going, there must still be people gullible enough to be falling for it...

[6FeetOver]

I suppose nothing should shock me, anymore... *Sigh*

[Petseri]

We may as well use this thread as the place to post spam PMs. The above offender has been binned, by the way.

Potentially fun read may be the 419eater sute. I espicially appreciate the guy gettng a tatoo.

[Pista]

[Quiff Boy]

wow, first of all i'd like to say i'm sorry to anyone finding one of these spam PMs from user sawh in their PM inbox

looks like the spammers have found a new way of getting their 'message' out to message board members

anyways, i've purged the system of all PMs from sawh and have deleted their account. that should have cleansed your inboxes (vicar! )

i'll look into ways of preventing this in future, either through PM restrictions on new users or increased security of some description.

also, i've asked the mod team to block PM permission for any users they ban. not entirely sure what extra protection that gives us as by that stage they should already be blocked from even accessing this site, but hey! a 'belts & braces' approach cant do any harm can it?

thanks for your patience and understanding

sorry about that

[reactiv8]

wow, first of all i'd like to say i'm sorry to anyone finding one of these spam nails from user sawh in their PM inbox

looks like the spammers have found a new way of getting their 'message' out to message board members

anyways, i've purged the system of all PMs from sawh and have deleted their account. that should have cleansed your inboxes (vicar! )

i'll look into ways of preventing this in future, either through PM restrictions on new users or increased security of some description.

also, i've asked the mod team to block PM permission for any users they ban. not entirely sure what extra protection that gives us as by that stage they should already be blocked from even accessing this site, but hey! a 'belts & braces' approach cant do any harm can it?

thanks for your patience and understanding

sorry about that

Thanks Capn'!
- As I'm partially guilty of raising a fuss about this 'triviality' I feel I should comment again ... (see below on this approach, which may be a 'novel' departure for 'yours truly', but one others might do well to cogitate on before unleashing their venom via the keyboard ...)

I'm not naive, or a pr*t, contrary to what some evidently like to think (you know who you are, eh?) - It is just that I was totally stunned to find this drivel on my favourite Web Forum! - Lulled into a false sense of security I suppose? However like you too I hope, I sincerely do want to keep our home free from suchlike and will co-operate with our leaders and their always wise decisions. Quiffy for PM? - Sure would be a massive improvement over Gordon Brown and his: 'Flightmare on Drowning Street' (see The Independent, Friday 25th - 'twas an hilarious advertisement ...)

Oh, and one last thing:

“It is a good rule in life never to apologize.
The right sort of people do not want apologies,
and the wrong sort take a mean advantage of them.�
P.G. Wodehouse, The Man Upstairs (1914) title story. Cf. Hubbard 1

“Never contradict
Never explain
Never apologise.�
John Arbuthnot Fisher, Letter to The Times, 5 September 1919. Cf. Disraeli 91, Hubbard 1

These men were surely pretty close to the mark, especially the former, and they are good rules to remember and consider, if not always to follow ...

[Quiff Boy]

thanks

[reactiv8]

thanks

We (I?!) am indeed not worthy! ...
I owe you a pint or five (or the poison of your choice). Oh Wise Master!
(It will be an honour to make your esteemed acquaintance one 'Gothic' night ...)

[Quiff Boy]

right, just a quick update on the spam-proofing situation:

i've tweaked the registration process so that the CAPTCHA image generated (the random numbers and letters) uses a different algorithm. the image generated by the new system is a lot less 'plain' and should hopefully make it less machine-readable

for a quick preview, log out and then go and try to register

one thing i have also done is to block registrations where the 'user' has set their timezone to GMT-12... let me explain:

the timezone option on the registration page uses a SELECT list (aka a drop-down list)

when spam bots fill in these types of form fields they invariably choose the first option, in this case GMT-12

now as that particular timezone does not really exist for humans ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UTC-12 ) its safe to say that if a user chooses it they are probably a spam bot

i've added a tweak that stops them registering if they choose that option as a timezone. spam bots will see a plain white screen and no account will be created

existing users can still choose it. it only effects the registration process.

its my hope that the gmt-12 fix and the captcha system will help prevent more spam accounts from registering

fingers crossed

[EvilBastard]

one thing i have also done is to block registrations where the 'user' has set their timezone to GMT-12...

Except now Amelia Earhart won't be able to log in...

[Quiff Boy]

one thing i have also done is to block registrations where the 'user' has set their timezone to GMT-12...

Except now Amelia Earhart won't be able to log in...

good riddance i say

damn those women pilots. damn them to hell

[6FeetOver]

one thing i have also done is to block registrations where the 'user' has set their timezone to GMT-12...

Except now Amelia Earhart won't be able to log in...

Wow, thanks for that tidbit, EB! I'd never heard of the place before, nor its history.
If only it had a fresh water source and some trees... *Sigh*

[Quiff Boy]

[EvilBastard]

If only it had a fresh water source and some trees... *Sigh*

I do like that "the fledgling colonists were given large stocks of canned food, water, and other supplies including a gasoline powered refrigerator, radio equipment, complete medical kits and vast quantities of cigarettes" - my kind of colonialism

[reactiv8]

Pardon me returning to this one belatedly,
but again you have excelled yourself Your Quiffness!

Without wishing to dwell on this, I now fully appreciate Sinnie's original response to my Bleating Topic in General Chat ... It is sad but true we live in a world inhabited by these morons who wish to pollute our forum, and although you do your utmost to keep them from us ... Nevertheless, there are sometimes cracks in the armour where they can creep in unexpectedly however vigilant you and we are ... Fortress Heartland rather defeats the purpose of an 'open' forum ... You can't win either way I guess, and we would moan too if we never had any new members, eh?! ... A delicate balancing act for sure:~ Freedom of Access & Speech vs 'Security' of Heartlanders ... A dilemma similar in many ways to that faced by politicians, who do a worse job in every way?! Whilst I hugely appreciate your efforts to 'protect' us and maintain the integrity of Heartland, also your calm and unflappable resolve is awe-inspiring! If nothing else I hope you gain some technical knowledge from the experience? It is just a thought, and probably one you have already considered, but are your measures better conducted in a covert way, with a(nother?) suitable warning and dis-clamier on the homepage and sign-in registration? It seems to me that the design of these is inevitably going to become more sophisticated, as we would hope, to attract and maintain Heartlanders, whilst dissuading and disabling malevolent intrusion too. Advertising said measures could perhaps be counter-productive, eh? Totally up to you, but perhaps PMs circulated to trusted Heartlanders only, based on a star system similar to e-bay and others, or a threshold of minimum posts? Just an idea, and doubtless you and others will have better ones, and probably already have such a system in place?! ...

Meanwhile:~ We remain your Humble Servants!

[Quiff Boy]

some very valid points there, and yeah. its atrade off between ease/simplicity of access & registration, and the security/privacy of members, and the general freedom from spam we should all be able to enjoy.

the new measures introduced in the registration process should hopefully neutralise a lot of attempted spam registrations, without making it too tricky for humans.

there is one other wee addition to the registration process i'm toying with making, where by you are asked to enter a simple word or phrase which either a) appears somewhere else on the page or b) any sisters fan should know

i've had a look at this particular addon and it seems to be one of the best in terms of offering guaranteed security whilst not being too in-your-face and severe.

as for 'advertising' the extra security measures - to be honest, the only one they could find a way around is the GMT-12 thing, and i don't think its an issue as the other stuff should keep us covered if they do find a way around that one. also, there are so many other forums and message boards out there that i doubt spammers will even care that the scripts are failing on heartland...