Spam is a very common technique to acquire personal information

Because I manage about nine websites, I have to manage multiple e-mail addresses. Spam is a very common technique to acquire personal information, to implement worms or viruses into any unprotected PC. Today, I received an e-mail with the subject: “Congratulations, lucky winner!”

Here comes the content: “We happily announce to you the draw (#1004) of the IRISH LOTTERY online Sweepstakes International program held on Wednesday 23 January 2008. It is now available for claims and you are getting the final NOTIFICATION as regards this. Your e-mail address attached to ticket number: 56475600545 188 with Serial number 5368/02 drew the lucky numbers:02, 03, 05, 08, 22, 42, Bonus 15, which subsequently won you the lottery in the 1st category i.e match 5 plus bonus.

You have therefore been approved to claim a total sum of £1,350,000(One million, three hundred and fifty thousand, pounds sterling) in cash credited to file KTU/9023118308/03. This is from a total cash prize of £4,419,864 shared amongst the (5) lucky winners in this category i.e Match 6 plus bonus. All participants for the online version were selected randomly from World Wide Web sites through computer draw system and extracted from over 100,000 unions, associations, and corporate bodies that are listed online.

This promotion takes place weekly. Please note that your lucky winning number falls within our European booklet representative office in Europe as indicated in your play coupon. In view of this, your £1,350,000 (One million, three hundred and fifty thousand, pounds sterling) will be released to you by any of our payment offices in Europe.

Our European agent will immediately commence the process to facilitate the release of your funds as soon as you contact him. For security reasons, you are advised to keep your winning information confidential till your claim is processed and your money remitted to you in whatever manner you deem fit to claim your prize.

This is part of our precautionary measure to avoid double claiming and unwarranted abuse of this program. Please be warned!”

This is quite funny, because I never bought a lottery ticket. 🙂 The purpose of these type of e-mails is to make you to deposit a small amount of money (usually less then $100) to “verify” your identity. Of course you won’t get any response/money from “the other party”.

Whenever you receive an e-mail from an institution you have to be aware of a few things:

1. An official institution will include in an e-mail your name.
2. When you click on any link, check your browser’s address bar. Check if the landing website belongs to your institution. Also, any URL should start with https:// and not http://.