In Australia, the problems of scam email, text messages, calls and more are pretty much the same as in the UK and USA.
But the Australian government is fighting back. Their efforts to reduce scam calls have worked well. “In the first 16 months after the Reducing Scam Calls code was put in place, telcos reported blocking over 549 million scam calls to Australian phone numbers, and there has been a dramatic drop in scam call complaints.
Now it’s time to go after the scam text messages.
The Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) registered new rules to require telecom companies to identify, trace and block SMS scams.
The ACMA worked closely with the Communications Alliance to develop the Reducing Scam Calls and Scam Short Messages industry code in response to evidence that SMS scams are increasing in prevalence and impact.
“These scam messages are deeply frustrating to Australians because they are received on devices that are an essential part of our social and economic lives. Almost every Australian adult and business is affected. We shouldn’t have to screen messages and adopt workaround behaviours to be able to feel safe and stay connected”
The harder we make it for scammers, the less Australians are likely to be targeted.”
“We expect to see SMS scams reduce as industry step up to do more to protect their customers,” she said.
Under the rules, telcos must also publish information to assist their customers to proactively manage and report SMS scams, share information about scam messages with other telcos and report identified scams to authorities.
Combating SMS and identity theft phone scams is an ACMA compliance priority, and telcos will face penalties of up to $250,000 for breaching ACMA directions to comply with the new code.
If you have any experiences with these scams do let me know, by email.
“Before you eat your breakfast, do this ONE shockingly simple ‘morning trigger’ to activate and rejuvenate your dead metabolism”. The only people with dead metabolisms are dead bodies and they don’t respond to scam emails. The email also claims that only the inhabitants of a tiny Indian ocean island know this secret. The scammer wants to make her stupid story sound exotic but it’s all just ridiculous.
A very simple scam email consisted of just one line “We the Toyota Corporation have a compensation for you due to the COVID-19 Pandemic. kindly get back to us for more details.”. The sender tried to make the email look like it came from the Toyota car company but the email address was obviously a personal one toyota.mgth.2020 @gmail.com. Pathetic.
The latest stupid health remedy email claims to banish all nerve pain, completely regenerate your nerves and maximise your energy. What could possibly all of these things instantly? Nothing! The scammer says you rub a bit of fruit peel on your hands and feet each day for the magic to happen. Rubbish to get idiots to click the dumb video clip.
Lots of scammers target people with websites so today’s attempt says “Dear customer, we were unable to process your payment for invoice #8910324187-9012 for domain renewal” and it lists the radio station Internet domain name. It wants me to click to process the payment again, but the sender is contact @ gardini.com which is not the hosting company for the radio station so it’s just lies as usual.
An email claims that eating half a teaspoon of this new product will increase my metabolism by 738%. Figures like this one that are too exact are obvious lies. However when your metabolism is running fast you generate a lot of heat and increasing by 738% during the night as claimed would be certain death unless you sleep in an ice bath.
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“Medic Feet” the new solution to any pain problem. Use the magic of acupuncture but without needles. You just wear these special sandals and all pain will vanish. There’s lots of sandals on the market with pressure bumps that stimulate acupuncture points and it’s possible they will help some people’s circulation etc. but they cannot be honestly described as the solution to all pain. Never buy from idiots who promise far too much.
A typical phishing email arrives titled “Attn: Verify Your Records”. It claims that’s due to Equifax’s latest security breach, my records have been compromised and I must login to verify. The email is from streamingmovie.site which is obviously not Equifax. No thanks.
“The Bible Has Cracked The Code for Longer Life”. There are lots of these crackpot emails aimed at Bible believers and this one says the bible mentions a specific nutrient that inhibits aging and can reverse todays deadliest diseases. You just have to click the link to get full details. Typical brainless rubbish.
There seems to be a permanent battle in the USA between those wanting everyone to have open access to firearms and those who want more controls on who and when people can have such weapons. A latest set of emails exhort people to take out a concealed weapons permit before the government makes it more difficult. The email explains that anyone can fill in the fast track online form and will get a concealed weapons permit unless they are an illegal drug user or have a criminal record. Is it really that easy? Who knows? But it is madness to try to push people to get further into weapons use without very good reason.
A new summer heat busting portable AC device claims to be taking the United States by storm. And of course you need to get one before they are sold out. Some of these messages are just spam adverts by people who have bought up a batch of portable AC device but many are scams – no products to sell, just someone who wants your name, address and credit card information. Only buy from reputable sources.
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Most email services have a maximum message size you can send and sometimes limits on attached file sizes. This is generally only a problem if you’re trying to send video clips but can occur if you want to send a group of high resolution pictures for example or a series of large documents.
Yahoo and Gmail limit is 25MB per message
Outlook limit is 20 MB but Office 365 expands considerably on this.
Paid for email services and business email systems may have much higher maximum message sizes or even no limit in some cases.
What to do when you want to email a very large file
Services like Dropbox have been created to solve this problem.
It is very efficient – you simply upload a file to Dropbox (or a similar service) using your free or paid for account and effectively send a link to the recipient and they can then download the file without filling up your or their email folders.
The Dropbox fake message scam depends on people being used to receiving these Dropbox messages and clicking to download the file.
Scammers upload a piece of malware disguised as an invoice or holiday template or some other document then send out Dropbox links to that document to a spam email list in hope at least some of the recipients will download and open the malware file.
If you receive a Dropbox file from someone you know and you expected the file, then fine.
If it’s from a person you know but didn’t expect a file, then contact them to see if the file is genuine.
But if it’s from someone you don’t know – then do not download whatever it is.
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