Fake scam recovery emails/messages

An interesting email dropped into my spam folder this last week and I discovered it when I went to clear the folder out.  I had been sent a fake email from Antonio Gutteres - the Secretary General of the United Nations no less!!  I mean that was my first clue - why on earth would this important man be messaging me via email?

Well I read the email and soon discovered a rather poorly executed email saying that victims of scams online including package scams and contractors bidding for non-existent work amongst others could email to receive compensation.

OK so take a look at the email address that is supposed to be that of the UN Secretary-General.  What do you notice?  Well, I hope you can see that the email address is incorrect.  It is not a genuine email address affiliated to the UN.  You can see that from the misspelling of unitednations with two i's.

So we now move onto the main body of the email.  I shall look at it paragraph by paragraph.

1.  The first paragraph is one single very huge and poorly constructed sentence.  It does not make sense because they are trying to make it appear authoritative and they don't have the skill in English to do so correctly.  There are mistakes with the grammatical structure and the use of punctuation.  This email would never have been sent out with Secretary General of the UN's name on it.  It is frankly appalling.

Paragraph two is full of the same nonsense.  It has spelling mistakes, punctuation errors, and is grammatically poor - this email would never have been sent out this badly constructed - what an image to send out of this World organisation.

Paragraph 2 moves onto the next screenshot and again just sounds wrong.  Where on earth is this compensation to the tune of 1.5 billion dollars coming from?? Also notice that the remit of the email is changing and the scams that can be compensated.

Paragraph 3 brings it onto me and why I've received this email. It is very flowery language constructed to make it look official.  In fact it doe the opposite with me and makes me skeptical and frankly amused.

Ok so paragraph 4 moves onto this screenshot.  Cheeky aren't they?  Saying that if you don't make a claim via telephone or email they will requisition your money for helping the displaced in Darfur and tsunami victims in Asia.  Well carry on as there is no money coming to anyone - me included.

Again, there are spelling mistakes, grammatical errors, and punctuation is used poorly.  I cannot stress enough that this just would be 100% unacceptable for any business to send an email out with these mistakes but one claiming to be from the UN Secretary-General is appalling.

So onto the next paragraph - the person to contact. And isn't this interesting she has a Nigerian phone number. Given that the Secretary-General is based in the UN HQ in New York City, you would think that she would be too, wouldn't you?  So why a Nigerian phone number?  Your email is from a Nigerian scam group. Please note that the email is rubbish as well - she would have a proper UN email address as discussed above, not one that looks like this.

OK so right at the end of the email you have who it is from.  There is also a blue hyperlink underneath to take you to an online resource to see who it is you are talking to - just in case you are a little unsure at this point. Note that it uses http not https. Do not follow any links sent to you like this at all ever.  They could contain malware and viruses that can wreck your device and phish for you secure information like passwords and bank account details leaving you vulnerable to being hacked or having accounts set up in your name.

Finally the last paragraph about receiving the email in error.  What a joke!! But it too is badly written with grammatical mistakes.

So, now we have walked through the email what do you think?  Genuine or fake??

The answer is clearly fake because of these reasons:

1.  It went to my spam folder for a reason.  My email provider detected that it was a fake.

2.  The emails used by the author and the phone number included for the contact are massive red flags.  They are incorrect and the contact number is in Nigeria.  

3.  The poorly written email.  The whole message is badly written with poor English,  spelling mistakes, grammatical errors, and punctuation that is used incorrectly.  I cannot stress enough that the Secretary-General would NEVER send out an email as poorly written as this one.

So what is the scam?  Suppose you decide to call the number or respond to the email?  You will be expected to provide them with a load of information about you.  Your personal details including your bank account details so they can send you your 'compensation'.  They get all this information about you that they can use to hack your accounts.  Will you receive any money?  Probably not.  They will likely ask you to pay an administration fee.  However, there is a chance that you may well receive cash.  Some will be for you to keep and a bigger chunk will be for you to pass onto someone else.  This is money laundering and a way that the scammers can legitimise their earnings from their scams.  Do not ever do this as you can serve actual prison time for laundering money like this.

The best thing to do with emails you receive like this is to add them to your spam folder.  This means that your email provider will do the same for any other emails you receive like this one from the same address. 

Whatever you do please do not respond to an email like this at all ever.  Just delete it or add it to your spam folder.