53. E-mail frauds

Further to my blog # 46, I should mention that Readers Digest did not contact me again, so their offer of prizes was presumably a fraud. Needless to say they do not publish the names of winners - not even fictitious invented ones. The actual winners of the scam are Readers Digest, of course.

I keep my internet security setting on 'medium' to avoid the blocking of incoming messages in other languages, such as Hebrew; as well as the blocking of the pictures of BBC news and of Lidl sales lists - they both come with pictures. As a result, scams similar to the Readers Digest mailing do get through. I just delete them unopened - I understand that this is safe. But despite my urge to reply, giving misleading details - including fictitious age (I'm 124), fake bank account numbers and address (mine is in Downing Street) etc, I was advised not to do so. The scammers would get evidence that my email is 'active' and I might be inundated with enormous amounts of follow-up mail next.

For interest, I have logged the following fraudulent emails over the last week:

# Rose Perez (later signed 'Parez') - offer of 10 million euro. So what's your real name?

# Deborah Russell - offer of cheap drugs.

# Mr Edes Abebe from Nigeria (African scammers usually use titles: 'I am Mr Edes Abebe') - 30 million pounds sterling are available for illegal transfer (of course), of which 30% are for me. Terrible grammar: use this money for English lessons, mister!

# Petra Newsome - offer of cheap sex drugs. That I find insulting - Petra should come and satisfy herself!

# Madam Jeanette from Ghana - offer of 2.7 million US dollars. It is signed by Mrs Jeanette Gideon Arab - presumably a rich hermaphrodite, or a two-faced bisexual freak.

# Mrs Angela Nkrumah from Accra, Ghana - 500,000 dollars. I forget whether the owner of the legacy had been a victim of his own body guard, or of a crocodile.

# Norris Milligan - cheap drugs.

# Fondazion di Vittirio - 500,000 dollars towards my education. They also need English lessons!

# Ferdinand Dotson - herbal drugs for slimming.

# Kelvin Snyder - cheap sex pills 'for treating erectile men's erectile dysfunction'. I can assure you, Kelvin, that I've never met an 'erectile man'... - have you?

# Rosie Sloan - drugs to enhance your sexual life, fast-acting.

Potentially, I could be slim, healthy, virile - and stinking rich - - I can but dream...