Recently, I've noticed all kinds of ads and spam e-mails promising to deliver a bail out of one kind or another. While we're finally going to see a few average people bailed out, most of these ads and spam e-mails have one purpose and one purpose only — to provide a revenue stream to a scam artist.
On March 4th, the FTC issued a warning that consumers might get stung by one of these bail out schemes and that these scams are showing up in many different forms.
A lot of these scams claim they can assist someone in qualifying for a bail out and all you need to do is to provide them with a little information or a small payment (preferably using a plastic instrument) to reap a too-good-to-be return on your investment. Plastic is quickly becoming the preferred payment option of criminals and semi-legitimate marketing gurus, alike.
Common spam e-mail messages ask for your banking information so the money can be direct deposited into a bank account. In most of these scams, the exact opposite occurs, or the money in the account is stolen. There are also a lot of spoofed spam e-mails that appear to come directly from a government agency, which ask you to verify that you qualify for a payment by providing them with personal/financial information. If responded to, they either clean out your financial resources or use your good name to steal from a financial institution.
The FBI, IRS and Federal Reserve have recently reported their names being spoofed (impersonated) in a variety of spam e-mails designed to scam people of their hard-earned resources. Of course, a lot of the e-mails and e-ads use the names of Barack Obama and Joe Biden to make their come-on appear more legitimate, too.
Some of these e-mails contain links, which lead to websites that download all kinds of malicious software and spyware on a machine. Normally, the intent in these instances is to steal personal information or take command and control over a machine.
Not all these come-ons come in spam e-mails, either. Much to my dismay, I did a search on the word "Stimulus" and found several ads offering a questionable bail out. After doing this, I went to my local coffee house and picked up some of available free magazines and found questionable bail-out offers in them, also.
When it comes to advertising dollars, those accepting the money aren't required to perform any due diligence on what is being advertised.
In some of the so-called semi-legitimate come-ons (my personal opinion), there might be a clause in small-print that allows them to charge your card a small fee over a long period of time.
While these so-called legitimate marketing ploys are nothing new, they are being seen used in some of the pay for bail out products being hawked all over the place.
If you've signed up for any of these deals, it might pay to review your statements, carefully. Of course, in today's world, it pays to do this on a regular basis, anyway.
If you see any of these scams and want to complain about them, the FTC provides an electronic means of doing so. I've provided a link for anyone, who might be interested in doing this. You can also complain by calling 1-877-FTC-HELP (1-877-382-4357).
Last, but not least, I'll point to a site called the Bank of Obama (Because Everybody Deserves a Bail Out). On this site — which appears to be somewhat of a parody — you can send your friends an imaginary check. At least this site delivers what it claims to — an imaginary check.
Showing posts with label obama. Show all posts
Showing posts with label obama. Show all posts
Saturday, March 14, 2009
Monday, January 19, 2009
Fake Obama Site is a Malware Booby-Trap
Over the weekend, I got an e-mail from my Mom warning me not to open any e-mail with the title "Obama Acceptance Speech" because it contained a trojan. It even cited Snopes as stating that the threat wasn't a hoax. I sent her a reply referencing the last post on spam I did, which had a paragraph about Obama spam on it. My point was anyone who thinks there is only one e-mail of this type is out there is probably sadly mistaken.
On Sunday, with the inauguration less than 24 hours away, I got a hot tip that the Symantec Lab had detected another round of Obama spam with malicious intent being sent across the electronic universe. Zuftikar Ramzan announced on the Symantec Security Blog that this latest round of Obama spam uses lures with titles like "Our new president has gone," "Obama refused to be the president of the United States of America," and "There is no president in the USA anymore and Obama has gone."
Zuftikar also mentioned a link in these e-mails (removed for safety reasons) leading to a faux website that looks amazingly similar to the official Obama-Biden site. The fake site can be seen below:
This fake site attempts to exploit weaknesses in a Web browser to install malicious software without the owner's knowledge. According to Zuftikar, the page and its links all have malicious software on them. In other words, the entire site is literally a virtual booby trap.
The files are titled usa.exe, obamanew.exe, pdf.exe, statement.exe, barackblog.exe and barackspeech.exe. While the titles might be different, they lead to the same variety of malware known as the W32.Waledac. This malicious software is capable of stealing sensitive information, turning your machine into a spam-spewing zombie and leaving a back door for a hacker to gain access to it.
Political themes have been used a lot in recent times to lure people into clicking on links in spam e-mails they shouldn't have. Other common lures include the old fashioned too-good-to-be-true, security and badge-of-authority types (IRS, FBI, CIA, etc.).
With tax season upon us, expect the IRS to be a common one used in the near future.Symantec does provide removal instructions for this malware on their site, but most of us are far better off by not clicking on this type of stuff in the first place. These e-mails are sent out by the millions and the best thing to do is hit delete before opening them up.
On Sunday, with the inauguration less than 24 hours away, I got a hot tip that the Symantec Lab had detected another round of Obama spam with malicious intent being sent across the electronic universe. Zuftikar Ramzan announced on the Symantec Security Blog that this latest round of Obama spam uses lures with titles like "Our new president has gone," "Obama refused to be the president of the United States of America," and "There is no president in the USA anymore and Obama has gone."
Zuftikar also mentioned a link in these e-mails (removed for safety reasons) leading to a faux website that looks amazingly similar to the official Obama-Biden site. The fake site can be seen below:
This fake site attempts to exploit weaknesses in a Web browser to install malicious software without the owner's knowledge. According to Zuftikar, the page and its links all have malicious software on them. In other words, the entire site is literally a virtual booby trap.
The files are titled usa.exe, obamanew.exe, pdf.exe, statement.exe, barackblog.exe and barackspeech.exe. While the titles might be different, they lead to the same variety of malware known as the W32.Waledac. This malicious software is capable of stealing sensitive information, turning your machine into a spam-spewing zombie and leaving a back door for a hacker to gain access to it.
Political themes have been used a lot in recent times to lure people into clicking on links in spam e-mails they shouldn't have. Other common lures include the old fashioned too-good-to-be-true, security and badge-of-authority types (IRS, FBI, CIA, etc.).
With tax season upon us, expect the IRS to be a common one used in the near future.Symantec does provide removal instructions for this malware on their site, but most of us are far better off by not clicking on this type of stuff in the first place. These e-mails are sent out by the millions and the best thing to do is hit delete before opening them up.
Sunday, January 04, 2009
Richardson Steps Down Because of a Scandal - What Else is New?
In the second scandal in recent weeks — where palms were allegedly greased to gain political favor — New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson has announced he is withdrawing his nomination to be President-elect Barack Obama's Commerce Secretary because of a grand jury investigation into how one of his political donors won a lucrative state contract.
The first scandal in recent weeks was, of course, Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich allegedly attempting to sell President-elect Obama's recently vacated Senate seat.
The federal grand jury is investigating how a California company, which contributed to Richardson's campaign, won a $1 million transportation contract.
Governor Richardson — who like Governor Blagojevich is not stepping down from his position as governor — has stated he is confident the investigation will reveal he acted properly in the matter. His rationale, as stated in this Washington Post article, is that the investigation could take a long time and he doesn't want to get in the way of important work that needs to be done.
President-elect Obama accepted the resignation with deep regret and cited Richardson's long history of service to the country, both at the state and the federal level.
The federal grand jury investigation in question was announced in mid-December and revolves around whether or not CDR Products was awarded a 1.4 million contract after making contributions to Richardson's political action committees. The contributions of $100,000 were made in 2004 by CDR (based in 90210, Beverly Hills, CA) shortly before they obtained the contract.
Reports indicate that this case is part of a larger one involving the FBI's investigation into "pay to play" practices involving governent bonds. In another part of this investigation, the mayor of Birmingham, Alabama, Larry Lanford, has been indicted for taking hundreds of thousands of dollars in gifts and loans that led his city into bad investments and ultimately, bankruptcy.
Al.com just reported that corruption has dominated the news in Alabama in recent history. In a telling statement, the article noted that corruption deserved top billing in 2006 and 2007, also. Alabama Governor Don Siegelman continues to try to overturn his 2006 conviction on bribery charges, and their Chancellor, Roy Johnson, plead guilty in a federal investigation of corruption in the state's two-year college system.
The sad thing is that politicians being charged and convicted of fraud are becoming too common. From a congressman allegedly getting caught with $100,000 in his freezer, to a senator allegedly accepting $250,000 in gifts from an oil company executive — I sometimes wonder if I am living in a foreign land, where we would expect this to be the status quo. Please note, there are many more examples of public figures getting caught with their hands in the cookie jar in recent history. Please note also that the incidents of alleged corruption involve leaders of different political affiliations.
As we are only days now from President-elect Obama's administration taking office, we face the worst financial crisis since the depression. Not only are we experiencing a financial crisis, but many believe our nation is severely divided; and to top it off, we are at war.
President-elect Obama has spoken out many times on the evils of special interests and lobbyists, who seem to be able to control our government's destiny. Even after Wall Street laughed all the way to the bank (for years) when the mortgage crisis was created — it seems we are being held hostage to bail them out or face even more severe financial consequences.
Change is what is needed and hopefully that is what is about to occur. On his transition website, President-elect Obama is encouraging open government and soliciting us all to write in with our own ideas. I think this a good thing and we all should do it. Our nation was founded in part because of taxation without representation and if you think about it, an argument might be made that this what we've been seeing in recent history.
During the election, I struggled a lot with how to cast my vote; my uncle (who is a huge Obama advocate) sent me a YouTube video about Obama set to John Lennon's song, Imagine. For those of us who still remember his music, Lennon had another song called Gimme Some Truth. What we need now is to imagine our leaders are there for us and to stop finding reasons to lose faith in them.
The first scandal in recent weeks was, of course, Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich allegedly attempting to sell President-elect Obama's recently vacated Senate seat.
The federal grand jury is investigating how a California company, which contributed to Richardson's campaign, won a $1 million transportation contract.
Governor Richardson — who like Governor Blagojevich is not stepping down from his position as governor — has stated he is confident the investigation will reveal he acted properly in the matter. His rationale, as stated in this Washington Post article, is that the investigation could take a long time and he doesn't want to get in the way of important work that needs to be done.
President-elect Obama accepted the resignation with deep regret and cited Richardson's long history of service to the country, both at the state and the federal level.
The federal grand jury investigation in question was announced in mid-December and revolves around whether or not CDR Products was awarded a 1.4 million contract after making contributions to Richardson's political action committees. The contributions of $100,000 were made in 2004 by CDR (based in 90210, Beverly Hills, CA) shortly before they obtained the contract.
Reports indicate that this case is part of a larger one involving the FBI's investigation into "pay to play" practices involving governent bonds. In another part of this investigation, the mayor of Birmingham, Alabama, Larry Lanford, has been indicted for taking hundreds of thousands of dollars in gifts and loans that led his city into bad investments and ultimately, bankruptcy.
Al.com just reported that corruption has dominated the news in Alabama in recent history. In a telling statement, the article noted that corruption deserved top billing in 2006 and 2007, also. Alabama Governor Don Siegelman continues to try to overturn his 2006 conviction on bribery charges, and their Chancellor, Roy Johnson, plead guilty in a federal investigation of corruption in the state's two-year college system.
The sad thing is that politicians being charged and convicted of fraud are becoming too common. From a congressman allegedly getting caught with $100,000 in his freezer, to a senator allegedly accepting $250,000 in gifts from an oil company executive — I sometimes wonder if I am living in a foreign land, where we would expect this to be the status quo. Please note, there are many more examples of public figures getting caught with their hands in the cookie jar in recent history. Please note also that the incidents of alleged corruption involve leaders of different political affiliations.
As we are only days now from President-elect Obama's administration taking office, we face the worst financial crisis since the depression. Not only are we experiencing a financial crisis, but many believe our nation is severely divided; and to top it off, we are at war.
President-elect Obama has spoken out many times on the evils of special interests and lobbyists, who seem to be able to control our government's destiny. Even after Wall Street laughed all the way to the bank (for years) when the mortgage crisis was created — it seems we are being held hostage to bail them out or face even more severe financial consequences.
Change is what is needed and hopefully that is what is about to occur. On his transition website, President-elect Obama is encouraging open government and soliciting us all to write in with our own ideas. I think this a good thing and we all should do it. Our nation was founded in part because of taxation without representation and if you think about it, an argument might be made that this what we've been seeing in recent history.
During the election, I struggled a lot with how to cast my vote; my uncle (who is a huge Obama advocate) sent me a YouTube video about Obama set to John Lennon's song, Imagine. For those of us who still remember his music, Lennon had another song called Gimme Some Truth. What we need now is to imagine our leaders are there for us and to stop finding reasons to lose faith in them.
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