OT: SCAM-Erick Bolt, FBI

These dirt-bags have been reaching out to Nebraskans, trying to "touch someone", and not in a good way.
We just received an email, unopened, of course. (we not stupid!)
A word to the wise, any contact by the FBI will NOT be by email, they have your phone number!
If it is important, men in dark suits, sunglasses and no smiles will likely knock on your door.

Yes the internet is a scary place!

Any possibility of useing secure connections here at cpaptalk.com?!?!?!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HTTP_Secure

Todzo wrote:Yes the internet is a scary place!

Any possibility of useing secure connections here at cpaptalk.com?!?!?!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HTTP_Secure

I'm certainly no expert on the internet (or the 'interweb, as my wife used to call it ) however, most blogs, forums and other member based organizations, plus many commercial type sites often block proxy servers, mostly because one's consistent IP number is the only way they have of telling who's who. I notice here on CPAPtalk a member will log on as 'blah-blah' and below that will be a tag saying "also listed as member 'hoohah' (or something like that). I've seen it many times.

chunkyfrog wrote:These dirt-bags have been reaching out to Nebraskans, trying to "touch someone", and not in a good way.
We just received an email, unopened, of course. (we not stupid!)
A word to the wise, any contact by the FBI will NOT be by email, they have your phone number!
If it is important, men in dark suits, sunglasses and no smiles will likely knock on your door.

LOL I have gotten those for years in various forms, also from the USA IRS. I don't even live in the USA.

If you get one from the Canadian IRS (CRA) or the RCMP, ignore it please too.

Sir NoddinOff wrote:

Todzo wrote:Yes the internet is a scary place!

Any possibility of useing secure connections here at cpaptalk.com?!?!?!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HTTP_Secure

I'm certainly no expert on the internet (or the 'interweb, as my wife used to call it ) however, most blogs, forums and other member based organizations, plus many commercial type sites often block proxy servers, mostly because one's consistent IP number is the only way they have of telling who's who. I notice here on CPAPtalk a member will log on as 'blah-blah' and below that will be a tag saying "also listed as member 'hoohah' (or something like that). I've seen it many times.

I do appreciate the efforts that are being made. Probably both wise and necessary.

Still pretenders concern me as the sign in pages, last time I checked, are not done with secure connections.

Todzo wrote:
I do appreciate the efforts that are being made. Probably both wise and necessary.

Still pretenders concern me as the sign in pages, last time I checked, are not done with secure connections.

You don't have a "secure connection" in real life either. Con artists are everywhere ready to relieve you of cash, some of them legitimately. "Buy in the next few minutes and we will throw in.... call now....", "We guarantee this reno will come in on time and under budget - sign here"

BlackSpinner wrote:You don't have a "secure connection" in real life either. Con artists are everywhere ready to relieve you of cash, some of them legitimately. "Buy in the next few minutes and we will throw in.... call now....", "We guarantee this reno will come in on time and under budget - sign here"

And it continues to blow me away that people fall for this type of crap! Don't they have radios, TVs, computers, read newspapers... how do people still not know that this goes on?!

Just saw on TV a week or so ago about a woman who received an email from a "service person" in Iran saying he was starving, in debt and desperately needed money. He promised faithfully to repay her when he returned to the states. This poor woman sent him $2,000.00! When questioned about it, on TV, she still couldn't believe it was all a scam.

Maybe the victims of these folks have sleep apnea - either undiagnosed or insufficiently treated. I know it has a serious impact on one's ability to make sensible decisions.

SleepyToo2 wrote:Maybe the victims of these folks have sleep apnea - either undiagnosed or insufficiently treated. I know it has a serious impact on one's ability to make sensible decisions.

Then again you can't discount the naturally stupid, they breed! Jim

You can defend the stupid but they are like cockroaches, everywhere!

I'm sorry you have so little sympathy for folks with impaired cognition,
But blaming the victim for a crime is totally uncivilized!
Even slightly gullible people have little control over who they trust,
and con artists are very, very adept in their craft, and in choosing their targets.
They do not need your help!

I've been getting a ton of emails lately saying I have to appear in court and to open the attachment for the details. Uh, I don't think so! But man, do they threaten with a lot of nasty stuff if I don't appear. So far, I'm still here!!

I've gotten to the point that I delete more emails than I open!

A family got nailed recently by one of those that lock up your computer and hold your files hostage until you pay. She swears she didn't open any suspect emails. Her computer is "dead in the water" at this point.

If you are really supposed to appear in court, a sheriff's deputy will serve you with papers.
Or you will receive a notice by registered mail, email is never used!
You can then contact the county clerk to verify the papers are genuine.

chunkyfrog wrote:If you are really supposed to appear in court, a sheriff's deputy will serve you with papers.
Or you will receive a notice by registered mail, email is never used!
You can then contact the county clerk to verify the papers are genuine.

Yep. I knew that. But for a split second, I was like "What?!?" Just a split second. And I was smart enough to back off the keyboard/mouse for that second and think about it. Then I'm like "Duh! Of course they won't EMAIL you the summons!!" --

I've gotten a half dozen of them in the last month. I'm also getting emails that LOOK like they are from Amazon about an order, the post office/ups saying they can't delivery my package, etc. You name it, I'm getting it. The bad guys are getting very smart about how they do this so I'm not surprised a lot of people get nailed by them.

There is another scam----the "no email registry"
A perfect scam, I must admit.
There may not even be a REAL registry, but we need one for sure!

Todzo wrote:Yes the internet is a scary place!

Any possibility of using secure connections here at cpaptalk.com?!?!?!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HTTP_Secure

You've mentioned this a few times. What does PKI, or more specifically browser based certificate verification, offer that you feel makes the cpaptalk environment more secure when using HTTPS? Any spider bot can suck down the entire repository and cross-index every single post. The information posted here is open and not protected AFAIK. The site itself participates in very few tracking artifacts and even these can easily be disabled with common privacy tools. Are you concerned about cross-site scripting?