Dear friends, the next round of drinks is on me. You see, I have just come into some money: £1,500,000.00 to be exact. Yes, it's true. This Aussie was fortunate enough to have won the British email lottery. Shhhhhhhhh. Don't tell anyone. I am supposed to keep this top secret otherwise someone else might try to claim my prize. All I have to do now is to deposit a small processing fee into a Nigerian bank account and the money is all mine!
I can't believe how lucky I have been over the past year. I have been inundated with offers of money and help from complete strangers.
First there was the lovely man from "technical support" who called me on my home phone, in response to my computer problem inquiry. The real problem being I don't own a computer and I never made such an inquiry, but my new friend was very quick to end our conversation once he realised his honest mistake.
This was much like the email I received in error from a bank I don't bank with, purporting to have frozen my account and requiring me to click on a link to reactivate it. Silly Westpac. Don't you know I don't have an account with you? Kudos on your excellent customer service and pre-emptive security measures though.
Then, last month, I was contacted by a generous citizen who wanted to share with me his secret for free energy. Wow, can you believe it? Free energy. Imagine how much money I could save with that!
Just yesterday, I received an email offering me a fabulous work-from-home opportunity which could make me thousands of dollars a week (no training, experience or qualifications necessary). Why didn't my high school careers adviser tell me about this before I wasted all that time and money on a law degree? Anyway, I won't be needing any of that … now that I have hit the jackpot.
Of course, I can have a laugh at these scams because I am savvy (and sceptical) enough to spot them for what they are. These are get-rich-quick schemes and sometimes malicious software gateways created by cyber swindlers. The hallmarks of these scams usually include an absurd promised "windfall", an odd use of the English language and an unprofessional looking email address.
However, not all members of our society can tell a scam from a legitimate enterprise and it is on their behalf that I am furious. These are often the elderly, the desperate for love, the trusting, the young. Our most vulnerable people. Scamwatch has about 13 categories of scams listed on its website. These range from dating and romance scams to health and medical scams. There is no limit to the imagination of these foul fraudsters.
My wish for scammers is that karma (or justice) catches up with them and after an appropriate amount of suffering, reflection and penitence, they use their creative business skills for good rather than evil.
In the meantime, if you get a letter from a stranger asking you to forward a $5 note to the name at the top of the list, add your name to the bottom and send it on to 10 friends … toss that letter into the recycling, keep your $5 and buy yourself a coffee. Actually keep it, I just remembered, the coffee is on me.
No issue is too small to raise Heckler's hackles. Readers can send pieces of about 400 words on what's got their goat to heckler@fairfaxmedia.com.au. Chosen submissions will be published online at smh.com.au/comment. Please include daytime phone details.
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