The Google Scammer

Todays email scam struck me more than the usual ones do as instead of claiming to come from some ambiguous fictional entity, this one claimed to be a lottery draw done by GOOGLE! I know Google get into a lot of different areas of business, but random online lottery draws probably will never be one of those products offered by Google. The scammers email follows;

From: info@google.co.uk [143.89.13.26]
Reply-to: gca01122009@windowslive.com
X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express 6.00.2600.0000
Message-ID:201004010022.o310Lxhb041468@mx4.ust.hk
To: My email
Date: Thu, 1 Apr 2010 02:25:41 -0700
Subject: GOOGLE NOTIFICATION.

Google Incorporation®.
Belgrave House,
76 Buckingham Palace Road,
London SW1W 9TQ,
United Kingdom.
Notification Date: 26/03/2010.


GOOGLE PROMOTION

Dear Lucky Winner.
We wish to congratulate you once again on this note,for being part of our lucky winners selected this year. This promotion was set-up to encourage the active use of the Google search engine and the Google ancillary services.
Hence we do believe with your winning prize, you will continue to be active and patronage to this company. Google is now the world leading search engine worldwide and in an effort to make sure that it remains the most widely used search engine, an online e-mail balloting was carried out on the 1st of March 2010 without your knowledge and was officially released today being the 26th of March 2010. We wish to formally announce to you that your email
address was attached to a lump sum of Ј450,000.00 {Four Hundred and Fifty Thousand British Pounds Sterling} only.

We also wish to inform you that you have successfully passed the requirements,statutory obligations, verifications and our satisfactory report test conducted for all our online winners. A winning Cheque will be issued in your
name by the Google Promotion Award Team, and also a certificate of prize claims will be sent along side your winning Cheque.

Your Award Winning Details.
Code Number: GUK/3554749405GK
Ticket No: GUK/1008272745GK
Winning Number: GUK/99334353734GK


Information's required from you are part of our precautionary measure to avoid double claiming and unwarranted abuse of this program.To claim your won prize,please contact your claims representative(Barrister Pascal Greene)neatly filling the verification and fund release form below.

VERIFICATION AND FUNDS RELEASE FORM.

(1) Your Full Name.
(2) Your contact address.
(3) Your Nationality/Country.
(5) Sex.
(7) Age.
(6) Occupation
(4) Your Tel/Fax numbers.
(8) Ever won an online lottery before now?
(9) Alternate Email Address.

You are advised to contact your claims representative with his private email details below to avoid unnecessary delay and complications:

***********************************************
Foreign Transfer Manager.
Pascal Greene
Google Security Department (United Kingdom)
E-mail: pascalgreene@8u8.com

Congratulations from the Staff & Members of the Google interactive Lottery Board Commission.

Yours Sincerely,
Mrs. Tracy Chapman
Google Zonal Coordinator.
London,
United Kingdom

How can you honestly not laugh at that? From the mere fact they're sent it from Google UK, to their Buckingham Palace address, inability to make the £ sign, the fact apparently noted country western singer Tracy Chapman now works for google and, oh yeah the fact google would of course get you to reply to either a web form or google email address, the fact Google don't do lottery draws and of course where all scam lotto falls down, the mere fact that if you've apparently won the draw, why do they need to ask your name, let alone the rest of the details? So first I hit reply to hit up the reply-to address

From: My email
To: gca01122009@windowslive.com
Date: Thu, 01 Apr 2010 23:04:30 +1000
Subject: Re: GOOGLE NOTIFICATION.

Hi Bill,

How are you going today? I must say I was surprised to hear from you, I was sure you had died in that unfortunate plane accident. You must tell me what happened. Where have you been hiding all this time?

Regards,

Peter

Unfortunately for this gag I almost immediately received a return de-sender on this message. It's gotta make you wonder, if the reply-to address, which differs from the google address the email apparently came from and thus helps to give the scam away doesn't actually exist what was the point of putting it in there? My next reply to the address they request reply to in the email made it through, check it out below.

From: My Email
To: pascalgreene@8u8.com
Date: Thu, 01 Apr 2010 23:30:42 +1000
Subject: Re: GOOGLE NOTIFICATION.

Dear Tracey,

Thank-you for your email, I was delighted to hear you had finally given up trying to sing and instead opted for a job behind a keyboard. The world will be glad to know we will never again be tortured by your voice. I feel that you should indeed call me by my first name instead of "lucky winner" even though I am very lucky and I'm certainly a winner, so please be sure to call me by my first name from now on. I really don't understand why you need all those details from me if I've won your draw. I mean shouldn't you already have them? Never the less, here they are.

*(1) Your Full Name. Mark Brown
*
*(2) Your contact address. 4 Bridge Street, Peterborough PE1 1EH**
*
*(3) Your Nationality/Country. British/England
*
*(5) Sex. Male
*
*(7) Age. 48
*
*(6) Occupation Financial Analyst
*
*(4) Your Tel/Fax numbers. Tel: 0345 456 456 4 Fax: 01733 424405*
*(8) Ever won an online lottery before now? No, never. I'm so lucky
*
*(9) Alternate Email Address. None

*
I would like it if you could please *FAX* me the details of my winning, what I have to do in order to pick up the winnings as well as your contact details as soon as possible. Faxing works better for me than email, as it will give me a hard copy for my records and my secretary will hand it to me as soon as it comes through. Where as emails may take me hours to receive. Be sure to put ATT: Mark Brown on the cover sheet to be sure it gets to me in a timely manner. I am very excited about winning this lottery draw. Also please be sure to telephone approximately 15 minutes after you have finished faxing through the information to make sure I have received your fax. Thank you once again Tracey, have a lovely day.

Kindest Regards,

Mark Brown
Senior Analyst
Barclays Stockbroking

The beautiful thing about this is the address, telephone and fax number I provided all actually exist! They all tie to the real life Mark Brown as well! Although some people would know him better as Sargent Mark Brown of the Royal British Police force. That's right, its the street address, telephone and fax numbers for the Peterborough Police department. And Mark Brown is the Sargent in charge of the station.

I wish I could see the look on the scammers face when the call the telephone number after faxing the details of the scam through to the police station, marked attention to the officer in charge and find out they've been nicked.

To make it even more funny, I wrote to Google, told them all about the scam and even went so far as to provide them with a copy of the message and FULL email headers. Now not only will the Royal British Police be interested in the scammer, but Google will be gunning for blood on a fraud law suit.

I have a feeling someone in Hong Kong is about to have a VERY bad day.