I Won!
Here’s one that showed up this morning in my email. It appears that I have won the lottery! Interestingly, I have never bought a lottery ticket in my life. Nevertheless, it seems that I’ve won, over in… England?
Below is the email I received, with a little commentary.
The Camelot Group.
Operators of the National UK Lottery.
3b Olympic Way, Sefton Business Park,
Aintree, Watford , L30 1RD
REF N0: UKL/74-A0802742006
BATCH NO: 2006UKL-01LOTTERY WINNING NOTICE
(so far it seems okay)
Congrats,
(Congrats?? That doesn’t sound so right… maybe there’s more stupid stuff down below! I’ll make some of the stupid stuff BOLD so you’ll catch it as you read.)
The United Kingdom National Lottery wishes to inform you that the results of the E-mail address of the ballot lottery international program(Bad Grammar) will be held five times every year. Your email account have been picked(Grammar, again) as a winner of a lump sum pay out of Eight hundred and Sixty Thousand Great Britain pounds(Upper Case Anyone?) (£ 860,000,00(How many zeros after that last comma?) pounds sterling) in cash credited to REF: UKL/74-A0802742006. This is from total prize money of GBP £4,459,670.00 shared among the FIVE (5) international winners in this category.
please(Caps?) quote your reference/batch numbers in any correspondences to our selected claim agent. Congratulations once more from all members and staffs(Staffs?) of this program, before(Comma or Period?) your claim agent could get this fund transferred into your account, He have to obtain(“he have to..”) a CERTIFICATE OF CLAIM AND INSURANCE CERTIFICATE from the Ministry of Justice of United Kingdom on your behalf; this is to certify you as original beneficiary(somebody died?) of the winning fund. Therefore we will need you to send him these Details listed bellow(spelling counts!) to obtain the Certificate and insurance of Claim and for the authentication of your fund documents into your name and as to enable you alone to have access to this fund in any of the bank account of your choice in your country.(That whole paragraph just reeks of WRONG)
Here are the detailsYour REF N0
Your FILE BATCH NO
Your full name.
Your full address.
Your private telephone, mobile and fax numbers.
Your country of origin.
Your date of birth.
Your Occupation.
Your Sex.
Your Marital status.
(And there’s the stuff they really want. Stuff that let’s them take your identity..)
To begin your claim, please contact your claims agent :
Name : Mr DOUGLAS DUKE
Mobile: +447031821203
Email : douglasdukeagent@gmail.comCongratulations again from all our staff and thank you for being part of our promotions program.
Sincerely,Mrs. caroline owen,(No CAPS in names)
Online Coordinator,
CAMELOT GROUP,
Operator of the National Lottery.Nuova grafica e nuove funzionalità! Crea subito Gratis la tua nuova Casella di Posta Katamail
Nuova grafica e nuove funzionalità! Crea subito Gratis la tua nuova Casella di Posta Katamail
(Shouldn’t the pc that sent this email about the British lottery include a footer in English?)
It impresses me that these guys even try. What impresses me more is that some people will fall for it. Applying a simple rule will always protect you from these types of scams. The rule? Look for the right grammar. If someone has risen to a position responsible for notifying the public about Anything, you can bet that person can apply the most basic grammatical rules to their correspondence. If there’s one mistake, my eyebrows are raised. If there’s more than one mistake, I know it’s a scam, regardless of anything else.
.
I am Jon, and that up there is a horribly crafted attempt to steal my identity, and maybe yours.
.
Yeah, I received two of those E-mails, the first one was like the one you described above. The second was more fancy with pictures. I decided to google it, because I was’nt sure if this was a scam or not. Thanx, I almost fell for this one.
I received one of those e-mails as you and was not sure about the truth ´cause few years ago I played the internet lottery, but now it´s clear a fraud. Thanks a lot! (Mexico)
LOL. THIS GUY EVEN HAS THE NERVE TO ASK FOR ‘A LITTLE BONUS’ AND AGAIN THE GRAMMAR IS THE TIP OFF.
How are you doing today? I am in receipt of your mail, And i must say that you should count yourself extremely lucky to have emerged as one of our winners in this years THE CAMELOT LOTTERY PROMOTIONS, and as for your informtion is for real , As you already know your email address was randomly selected along with others from over 125,600 websites on the internet.
Each email address was attached to a ticket number. Your email address kcullett@netzero.net was selected along with six others as winners.
A certificate of prize claims and your winnings cheque will be sent to your location.
Contact our delivery department with the contact information below for further instructions on how to send the consignment to your location.Please you should also send a copy of your verification form down to the security company to as to authenticate your lottery winnings.
Below is the name of the security agent you are to forward your verification form to:
DELIVERY DEPARTMENT.
Courier Officer Name: Mr. Cole Anderson
Name Of Delivery Company: PACIFIC TRUST COURIER SERVICE COMPANY.
Email: pacifictrustcourier.co@gmail.com
Tel: +447 0319 59534, + 447 031 914 680.
Have it in mind that your won prize cannot be deducted from your winnings, this is because the total amount has been insured to the real value . This is in accordance with section 13(1)(n) of the national gambling act as adopted in 1993 and amended on 3RD July 1996 by the constitutional assembly.
This is to protect winners and to avoid misappropriation of funds. Its is imperative that you add your IDENTIFICATION NUMBERS{CPEL/OWN/5368/02} as the subject of any correspondence with the courier company to ensure they respond in a timely manner.
I will require a concise update on proceedings with the firm as soon as you are in contact with them.If you need any assistance whatsoever, please do not hesitate to let me know. And i do hope you will consider me for a little bonus after you have received your winnings.
Once Again Congratulations…
Regards,
Agent: Barr.Cerutti Martins.
Phone: +447-024-023-291
Time to call (10am to 5pm London time GMT)
The Camelot Group UK .
I seriously cannot stop laughing Kathy!
Thank you for sharing that one with us, especially because of the “bonus” line.
As Vizzini says (constantly) in my favorite movie, The Princess Bride: “INCONCEIVABLE!”
I like to read these little missives out loud and add a Nigerian accent, it really goes with the grammar readily and proves where each and every one of them come from. I get at least three a week in variations on the same theme.