Category: Phishing

Stupidest Scam of the Week Pepsico

Shamaa Gaber of Pepsico LLC procurement Operations calls us a valued supplier.

She has a request for us. But first she complains that she called the number on the website and got no answer. If we were a trusted supplier then she have the direct phone number of course and know the name of the person she’s sending emails to, but she doesn’t know either.

She wants a quotation on supplying to Pepsico as per our company stated products.

Clearly this is a general purpose scam sent out probably by the million random email addresses. The sender has no idea of what products we sell, if anything.

As a radio station, the request is obviously a scam but hopefully anyone else would also realise it’s fake.

The email has lots of details over several pages but it’s all a bit wrong – written by someone who has little idea what the words mean.

e.g. Categorically the invoice submitted must be completely identical to the supply order. Any differences between the two must be explained.

Two items cannot be both identical and different at the same time.

Shamaa’s job title at the bottom of the email is ‘Execution Professional’ – sounds like an assassin rather than a purchasing manager.

The point of the email is not to get a quotation for some random product but to get the recipients to click the link that says “General Requirements”. That is the link to a malware site.

No thanks.

If you have any experiences with these scams do let me know, by email.

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Don’t Fall For Phishing Scams

Phishing is where the scammers send out messages attempting to trick people into divulging their login and password or other personal details or financial details. Often this is by pretending to be from the government or a trusted retailer or broadband supplier or any trusted organisation.

It is nearly impossible to avoid these people getting your contact information but you can reduce the chances as follows:

Phishing is where the scammers send out messages attempting to trick people into divulging their login and password or other personal details or financial details. Often this is by pretending to be from the government or a trusted retailer or broadband supplier or any trusted organisation.

It is nearly impossible to avoid these people getting your contact information but you can reduce the chances as follows:

  1. Learn to spot the spams

Be careful over any emails that you did expect and check the details for the signs of a scam. These include:

  • The content makes little sense e.g. from a Chinese company trying to sell you replacement valves for your generator.
  • The sender is unknown or anonymous.
  • The email may contain misspelled words and sentences purposely designed to fool spam filters such as Amaz0n for Amazon.
  • Offers that seem too good to be true.
  • A desperate urgency, pushing you to click or respond immediately or lose the chance.
  • Links that when you hover the cursor over them go to somewhere that doesn’t match the link.
  1. Avoid public posts

Anytime you put your email address on the Internet it can be seen and recorded by many people. Be careful where you sue your email address and if necessary create fake temporary email addresses.

  1. Use graphics to disguise your email address. Make it into a graphic – that is more difficult for screen scrapers to make sense of.
  2. Confuse

Scramble, your email address by using HTML and JavaScript in emails. This is harder for screen readers to see the real email address.

Be careful with your email address – you don’t want it to taken over by scammers.

If you have any experiences with these scams do let me know, by email.

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