INTERNET E-mail scammers are at it again; 'winner' beware

Some things about the e-mails should be sure tip-offs to potential victims.
By DON OLDENBURG
WASHINGTON POST
"Congratulations!" read the e-mail that Fairfax County, Va., reader Jill de Roos recently got, ostensibly from "International Lotto UK." The message: You've won the lottery! Prize: $2.5 million!
Designed to resemble what a lottery winner notification might look like, the e-mail included reference and ticket numbers and urged the recipient to "immediately collect your prize" by contacting the "financial handler" by the listed telephone, fax or e-mail.
"I suspect it is fraudulent," wrote de Roos, who forwarded the e-mail to the police in London, then wondered what else she could do.
De Roos' instinct was on target. One of several similar you-won-the-Lotto spams that have bounced around in-boxes the past few weeks, this one's a dressed-up variation on standard advance-fee scams and those pesky "Nigerian" money schemes. It's also yet another testament to the too-good-to-be-true maxim.
While this particular scam is slicker than most, containing bureaucratic verbiage and official steps to take to claim the money, there are clues it's bogus.
"The first indication that it's a scam is the fact that you probably never entered the 'UK International Lotto,' so how could you have won it?" says Susan Grant, director of Internet Fraud Watch, a project of the National Consumers League.
Secrecy warning
Another clue, says Grant, is this e-mail's secrecy warning "to keep the information from the public" so as not to compromise privacy and security. "You need to keep this good news a secret for some reason," she says. "This is probably designed to discourage you from checking it out with anyone."
By the way, if you're wondering who in the world is dumb enough to get snookered by a cheesy e-mail scam, the Consumers League estimates that online fraud in 2002 ripped off more than $14.6 million.
Consumers who respond to lottery scams like this typically are instructed that to receive their prize they must first pay taxes, tariffs, attorney fees, "good faith" money or transaction fees, usually thousands of dollars, or provide bank account information so prize money can be deposited directly.
But, of course, the money flow goes the opposite direction only. Once you've sent money or your bank account has been tapped, or your financial information is used in identity theft, you never hear from these phony lottery officials again.
Where's your name?
Another tip-off: This winner notification doesn't list you personally by name anywhere -- not even in the "to" address line of the e-mail. It's a spammed e-mail sent probably to hundreds of thousands, maybe millions, of other "winners."
Besides, legitimate lotteries wouldn't notify winners through an unsecure medium such as e-mail, says Grant. "Not bloody likely, as they might say in the U.K. Though these scammers could be anywhere in the world -- but they're probably not here in the U.S. because they know it's harder to pursue them outside the country."
Bottom line: Report suspected scam spams to law enforcement authorities and consumer groups that do pursue them legally. At the minimum, delete the e-mail.