Web Scammer or Big Brother ?
 

I'm on several other forums, some frequently, some not. CorvetteForum/C4/Tech-performance is one of the unfrequent ones. Mostly when something breaks. 2,512 posts since August 2001. I did a lot of techie stuff; trans swaps; EPROM burning; shifter swaps; exhaust upgrades. Car stuff. Lots of posts; many threads. :)

So today I wake up with a Friend Request from a 'Vickie Campbell' in Antioch CA. Her 'About' says - Local 107 Stagehand, Oakland, CA. , white 1986 Corvette, Female. Member since 05-09-2017. No posts. No threads. One other Friend, Renee73. Renee73 has been a member since 02-17-2020. Also no posts, no threads. And as of this afternoon, no longer a friend of Vickie's. :rolleyes:

So...Am I being set up for some kind of scam??? Or are the authorities running some kind of sting operation??? :confused:

I sent a PM asking what area of the C4 'she' was interested in, as I've posted about many. No reply.

I know I'm paranoid, but am I paranoid enough??? Maybe just some bored chick thing, joining an obscure Forum to bug guys???

If it's a scam, it's a new one on me. :D

Oh, I accepted her Friend Request. :rolleyes:

IF you are wondering..it's a scam.

Yeah, I figured. Back in the early days of the Internet and web Forums, guys who wanted something would register as a girl, and the Forum members [guys] would flock to help 'her'. I imagine by now it's a pretty sophisticated business, with pics, fake addresses, believable storylines, etc.

They know it's hard to pass up for a sucker like me. :thumbup:

Some scammers evidently get user names years in advance, I assume they get 'sold' on the dark web?

I hate scammers almost as bad as thieves...

I remember back in '09, some guy selling pills would log onto this Forum early in the morning, advertising Viagra in a thread, and dozens of other pills. I'd PM Ed or whatever mod was around and the thread would disappear. :D

Good times. :)

or

OK, There is a sure way to check it out. Just ask "her" one important question for authentication. "Show me your crank knobs." Either she has a Luger or she doesn't!

One warning the social security office never ask for your SSI number. My granny before her death got ripped off after giving the alleged SSi rep confirming her SSI number!

In various jobs I've supervised data security. I also at one point worked for a data security firm. So I have an academic interest in scams.

It's discouraging how they get a little bit more sophisticated every year. It's an arms race - the hardware/software vendors try to stay ahead of the curve, and often do, but not always.

If there is any question at all - assume it is a scam. Never, never ever click on or open an attachment unless you are 100% sure it is legit.

Never, never ever click on or open an attachment unless you are 100% sure it is legit. I ain't 100% sure the sun comes up in the East..or sets in the West! There's a 14% declination in the magnetic poles and you can see it when the sun sets..different places Summer, Winter, Spring and fall! Is ANYTHING EVER 100%?

What?!? You mean this ISN'T the beginning of a beautiful friendship??? :crying:

OK, I got a PM from 'Vickie'. She described some electrical problems she is having with her 1986 Vette. Coincidentally, they are the same problems I've had with my 1986 Vette! I remember starting a thread describing my starting/VATS problems some years back. Just a few weeks ago I posted about my courtesy lights staying on after closing the doors and subsequently draining the battery overnight. Wow, talk about coincidences! ;) It's like 'Vickie' read my recent thread and then Searched out my previous posts. And asked for help. So as to 'set the hook', so to speak. :p

I'm thinking that maybe I should just offer to send her some money to get her Vette fixed. :roflmao:

Jerry, back in the 60's I had a compass fixed to my bedroom wall. One of those JC Whitney auto compasses with the compass mounted on a gymbal that allowed it 360 degree movement. My buddies laughed at me, but over the course of a year, it actually did move!!! I was triumphant but my buddies didn't believe me. Such is life among the flat-Earthers. :(

I'm thinking that maybe I should just offer to send her some money to get her Vette fixed. So the question is..how much money? Answer. All of it.

I had a call today and was informed I had won 18 million and as a bonus 5K per week. So now I am a millionaire. Some of us are just plain lucky. I can get the money after I send 5K for legal fees. I told them to take it out of my first 5k bonus. Then they hung up. I guess it's back to broke. Bill

too soon!
 

Hi Bill, Millions you say? Maybe if you'd hung in there, you could have got enough to by a 50 round box of ammo??? Probably not, but now you'll never know! Best, til...lat'r....GT....:cheers:

I went with the 'common good' course of action and reported 'Vickie' to the moderator. I think I mentioned in another thread that I had fallen victim to a skimmer on another Forum. The way that one went was, I had posted in the Wanted To Buy sub-forum about a part I needed. A new forum member responded and said he had a buddy who had all kinds of parts and he probably had what I needed; email him at jerry-tinker@gmail.com. Well, I did, and never got a reply. But I did start getting lots of spam. Eventually I figured it out and blew the responder in to the mods. The guy was harvesting email addresses from the WTB forum. Not just me, but dozens of others. :(

I went to People-Finder and if 'Vickie' really exists in Antioch CA, she is 60 and has a 65 year old husband and has lived at five different addresses in the last five years. :rolleyes:

If she was 25, or even 30 (or 40), I'd be on the next plane... :thumbup: :D :p

The amount of information gathering on the net is amazing (and frightening).

When I went to Berlin in the beginning of 2019 to study German language and culture I obtained my accommodations through the Institute. Much to my surprise my housemate was a 30 year old Czech nurse. We lived together again in 2020 and over time became mutual best fiends.

In July of 2020 she started a new job in Regensburg and moved to an apartment there while I returned to the US.

She was really proud of her new apartment, so I decided to send her a housewarming gift.

I purchased a nice framed art print of the Berlin skyline printed on linen. I bought it on the German website of a Swedish company paying in Euros with my German credit card and had it shipped directly to my fiend.

Before the day was over that picture showed up on my wife's computer in Virginia.

Before the day was over that picture showed up on my wife's computer in Virginia. Could be a lesson there for the rest of us?

Yes. Don't get married. :thumbup:

I bought it on the German website of a Swedish company paying in Euros with my German credit card and had it shipped directly to my fiend. And it STILL showed up on my wife's computer in Virginia. OK, The dark web is next...

Recently I've received half a dozen "friend" requests, all from young attractive women often showing a LOT of cleavage or a sexy pose. Hell, I'm 78 years old and been married to the same fantastic woman for almost 54 years. I always delete such requests.

Once, I received a leading email from - supposedly - three teenage girls. I immediately told them that I was 74, married and had no interest in them. I've always thought it was an attempt by the FBI or another LE agency to entrap me. You can't be too careful when dealing with unknown sources.

iF YOU RUN YOUR NAME AND CITY, EVERYTHING COMES UP!!

Oh, wow! No way I could resist this! :D

[Edit: deleted in the interest of friendship]

...Seems like only bad things come up... :(

Huh! I ran my name & city, pretty much everything came up. Phone, address, age, possible relatives...Some stuff incorrect, but enough to doppelgang me... :mad:

Google is NOT your friend.

Evidently not. :( This means that more than a few old flames know where to find me... :eek:

True. There's a saying with data security folks: if you don't know what the product is, you're the product. Google being the most perfect and ubiquitous example.

IMO for all practical purposes there is nothing free on the internet. You pay for it via disclosing information when you visit those sites.

I love maps, navigation, stuff like that. Years ago when I heard the Govt. was going to make GPS available to all, my first reaction was not "oh goody" but "why?" It didn't smell right.

Now I know. They know where you live, work, everywhere you go and everything you do (inferred, when you have your cell phone with you).

Unless you are using encryption and/or other security measures, you should assume that everything you do online is observed by commercial interests/the Govt. And cross-matched and correlated to you personally. And then compared to other data sets to take many very good guesses at what you like, don't like, believe, etc.

I have seen your picture,,,,I don't think it is going to be any girls....:D

What??? You think that 28 year old pic wouldn't attract girls??? :grr:

http://forum.lugerforum.com/image.ph...2&type=profile

I Need Unknown Girls Like A Third Armpit!

What?!?! :eek: You mean the cable TV people are keeping track of what I watch??? The phone people are recording my phone calls??? The Google people are listing my pr0n sites??? Mt car is telling Big Brother every time I visit the supermarket??? The supermarket is listing what I like to eat??? The pharmacy is tallying my prescriptions???

That's crazy!!! You're describing a police state!!! Next you'll be telling me there's a tele-screen behind my bedroom mirror!!! That television news is being manipulated!!! That history is being rewritten!!! That my very existence is being altered!!! :grr:

Thank the Lord that we have a benevolent government to guard against such fantasies!!! :thumbup:

/sarcasm

(An interesting read -
https://smleo.com/2017/10/10/the-pow...4-big-brother/ )

We don't, they do, but it all produces so much data there is no way anyone can read or see it.

So unless you become "a person of interest" no one will ever see it.
But put one innocuous seeming word in a post or e-mail that triggers their 'key words" and they will pull up every trip to the bathroom,

A good movie to watch is "Enemy of the State" - I like Gene Hackman movies anyway.

Have you seen "The Package" [1989]?. Hackman, Tommy Lee Jones, some other B-characters. Pretty good. :)

I've watched it several times over the years. It is a good movie and worth watching.

Some newer TV sets have a camera and can 'listen' too. But, that can be undone, I think. My son-in-law noticed those features on their new TV and disconnected them. Also, your 'smart phone' can do that too. My wife was talking to a person and they asked who I was when I entered the room! So yes, there is a "tele-screen" in your house!

I first saw this about 6 years ago and its only gotten worse.

Do yourself a favor and watch this ... it will change your view on this world of ours. :(
'They' know EVERYTHING about you - and do you know how ??
SELF CONTRIBUTED DATA

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0XdsaCVZ1ck

Greg, A fascinating look into our exposure to privacy theft..no not theft. WE actually voluntarily give it away. But like gravity..what can you DO about it? From what I can tell this vid is say 10 years old? It HAS to be 10-100 times worse now. I think back and remember the first time you needed a "card" at the grocery store to get a discount. They forced you to let them spy on your buying habits.

They did not "Force" you

You voluntarily agreed to the spying to save $0.15

That must not work too well. The brands/products I liked best were replaced by inferior/poorer tasting ones. All the supermarket did was 'force' me to seek out local food vendors ['restaurants'] selling tasty food. I 'eat out' more now than I ever did. :rolleyes:

And why do the supermarket food products insist on putting cheese in/on everything??? I like cheese, but not on everything!!! :mad:

Every document you filed with a government agency is a public record. It starts with your birth certificate, your driver's license, your marriage certificate, your mortgage deed, college records, military records, business records, FFL, and especially obituaries (sorry, I've been writing more of those than I want to).

Most government agencies and even colleges sell your information or provide it on-line for free. While the IRS, SS and medical records aren't allowed to release personal information, it's out there already via other vendors who do require it. That information is sold and published, even without Google. You can track me just by my driver's license.

I still get junk mail addressed to my name, exactly how my college alumni association mis-spelled it 50 years ago !! I never even joined the alumni association. The great state of Georgia used to use our SSN for our driver's license number, as if that was a good idea. Then they sold all their driver's license data on the open market. Same thing the university and my credit union, who thought an SSN made a great and unique account number, until it got printed on all my checks !?

Before the internet was so available, there were Criss-Cross references that realtors and door to door sales people would use. The phone book provided phone number, but there were other publications that published un-listed phone numbers. Cell phone numbers are supposed to be un-listed, but you can subscribe to a cell phone directory service, if you want to.

The military regularly posts Wikipedia pages for military officers.

I never give out my SSN or date of birth, but then my well meaning stock broker, dentist and doctor's office all send me an unsolicited birthday cards.

I recommend using a VPN connection service (Norton), particularly with your cell phone. It's a smart step and now it's very affordable encryption.

Big brother is watching everything we do and so are our favorite vendors. Ever notice when you buy something on-line, you start getting targeted ads on-line for similar products or even the same thing? That's not any accident. Don't blame Amazon, Ring or WalMart - blame Apple, Dell, HP and Microsoft - they invented it and sold it to those vendors. Cookies were just the beginning. Ad tracking is just coming of age and it will be much more invasive in the coming months.

And you don't even have to go to the "dark Web" to find this stuff. Most of it is in public records.

I blame Congress for not addressing the problem head-on.

Jerry rather than reply to you with a long/boring post, I would just say you must do research. There are tools out there.

The basic tools of the Constitution to protect us remain, and while the trend is concerning it is not fair to call the USA a police state. This mess has grown organically and haphazardly, and govt. and commercial interests are simply exploiting the landscape that has grown around them. It is sort of like air pollution used to be. I remember as a kid in Los Angeles during the 60s how bad the smog could get. People became aware, demanded action and it's gotten better.

There is a growing awareness of the magnitude of the problem and many firms, Apple in particular, are moving to improve protections. Use Apple products, use the available security features, use a better browser like Duck Duck Go, and overall do research on ways to protect your privacy and implement them.

https://duckduckgo.com