Monday, January 15, 2007

Martin Luther King Speech

Delivered August 28, 1963:



Also, his final speech delivered the evening before his assassination:

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posted by Matthew O. Smith @ 1:21 PM 4 comments

Anatomy of a Stock Scam Email

I received a stock alert (scam) email today. Normally, I would just mark it as spam and forget about it. Today, instead, I am going to provide a public service and identify everything about this email that is a problem.

First, the questionable email itself. Remember, this is scam. This is only a scam.
From: Tracey North [annotatedisbursement's@aadey.force9.co.uk]
To: Cathy Kucherak
Subject: Rebel: 'We aided bin Laden escape'

OPEN UP FRIDAY WITH A BANG!
Sy mbol: SFWJ
On: PinkSheets
5-Days Target: $2.50
Long Term Target: $9.50

Exposure of there technology to the market has generated a great deal of interest and word on the street is that they are preparing a announcment concerning several large contracts with major providers, giving them a huge competative jump in the market.


1 - Unknown sender email

I do a lot of communication over the Internet via email and have a lot of people in my address book. However, I am familiar with most of their email addresses and can recognize people I know. Even if I am not sure, can I look in my address book and verify.

If you receive an email from an email address unfamiliar to you, question it thoroughly before accepting it as valid. This goes doubly so if they are wanting your money.

2 - Strange punctuation in the email

Email addresses need to be understood by computers in order for them to be delivered properly. Computers are not very good at guessing what you wanted so it is necessary to format email addresses properly. Part of this formatting is what letters, number and punctuation are allowed as part of an email address. The most common forms of punctuation to see in an email address are:
  • @ (but only one)
  • .
  • -
Other forms are allowed, but are very uncommon.

If you see a strange punctuation in the email address, like the quote (') in this one or a space in a strange place, question the validity of the email.

3 - Unknown sender

You know most people who send you email. You might know them personally or be associated with them through work or other online interests. The point is, the email that you are interested in comes from people you know or have some relationship with. This email comes from someone, Tracey North, I do not know. Nor am I familiar with the company listed in the From email address, aadey.force9.co.uk.

If it is from someone you do not know, do not trust it.

4 - That is not me

People you know and address lists you have signed up for will address the email to you. It is really a simple concept. Why would I get an email addressed to someone else? Because it is a scam, of course. In this example, the email is addressed to Kathy somebody. I am not Kathy, have never been Kathy and probably will never be Kathy.

If an email is not addressed to you, it is most likely not for you or at least not in your best interest to pay it any attention.

5 - Nonsensical subject

When someone sends you an email, they will most always include a subject that make sense by itself, make sense in the context of a previous conversation or makes sense based on the subject matter. The subject line is in someways the single most important part of an email message.
The subject of this message, Rebel: 'We aided bin Laden escape', makes no sense, has nothing to d with the body of the message and isn't even grammatically correct. It sounds like the silly things you see in manuals poorly translated into English from other languages.

If the subject is not related to the subject matter, it is probably a scam or a spam. Spammers often use subjects that entice the received to open the email on a gut instinct level. Someone helped bin Laden escaped? How Awful! I must read that.

So far we have 5 signals that this email is a spam and a scam:
  1. Unknown sender email
  2. Strange looking email address
  3. Unknown sender
  4. Not addressed to me.
  5. Nonsensical subject
Without even looking at the message, I already know it is a spam. I can safely add this message to the spam or junk folders and move on with my life. However, in this case, I want to address also the content of the message and address the warning signs it contains as well.

1 - Stock advice.

This email is a supposed stock advise to let me know of a great stock deal. I did not ask for such advice. Why is it coming to me?

The scam: This scam is designed to manipulate the price of a stock and works something like this. The scammers find a stock, usually of a failing company and any company with a stock price less than $1.00 a share is failing, and buy a lot of stock in it. Then, they send out a spam "stock tip" to millions of people. When people buy the stock, the price goes up. If they can fool enough people into buying the stock, then the price will go up. Once the price has risen suffciently, the scammers then sell their stock at a nice profit, leaving all the people holding who bought the stock holding a worthless stock.

The lesson: Do not take stock tips from anyone you do not know. Even then be very wary.

2 - Strange misspellings

Notice how the word symbol in the message is spelled. It has a space in it right? A professional organization would not allow that to be sent out so why is it there?

The scam: Many email systems now include spam filters of some kind or another. As the filters get better at spotting spam, the spammers get better at finding ways past them. The stock advice scam has been going on for a while now so the filters know to look for these types of email. To fool the filters, the spammers intentionally misspell keywords that the filter uses. These misspellings include spaces in strange places, replacing letters with punctuation (a=@ or V=\/) , or having the body of the message be an image instead of normal text.

The lesson: Misspelled keywords are a deliberate attempt by spammers to thwart the spam filters. Legitimate sellers and marketers do not need to resort to such tactics.

3 - PinkSheets

Stocks are traded somewhere. The big places are the NYSE and NASDAQ. But there are other place and one of those places is called PinkSheets. According to an article in USA ,
Securities lawyers, regulators and accountants are highly suspect of stocks that trade on the Pink Sheets. That's because there aren't many legitimate reasons for a clean company to list on the Pink Sheets, says Mike Starr, partner at accounting firm Grant Thornton. Starr says his firm won't touch them as clients. "We don't get involved with companies listed on the Pink Sheets. Frankly, there's too much risk, because there's a reason they're on the Pink Sheets."
The scam: Use an under regulated stock list to fool people into making poor investments.

The lesson: PinkSheets is not your friend.

4 - The stock symbol:SFWJ

Then you enter this symbol into a legitimate stock search engine, like Yahoo!, you get:

'SFWJ' is no longer valid. It has changed to SFWJ.PK

Notice the change to have .PK on the ended. That means the stock has been moved to the PinkSheets, and we already have been warned about anything listed on PinkSheets.

The scam: Not giving you the real stock symbol.

The lesson: Use a reputable financial service to locate investment information.

5 - Target prices

Real stock advisers avoid giving price predictions. They can be held liable for misleading information. No one can predict the future.

The scam: Giving highly inflated predictions of quick return on the investment makes people greedy and also gives them a false sense of confidence.

The lesson: No one can predict the future price of a stock.

6 - Insider information

Company insiders, like executives and other decision makers, are often aware of upcoming events at the company that will affect the price of the stock. They could then position themselves to take advantage of these events, to the disadvantage of those not privy to the insider information. For this reason, there are strict rules governing insider trading with stiff penalties, even for Martha Stewart.

7 - Misleading Press Releases

As I did a Google search on SFWJ and came up with some hits that looked like legitimate press releases touting the stock. Anyone can issue a press release, even a spammer.

The promise for this stock: from .50 to 2.50 in 5 days.
The reality: The stock opened in November at 9.00 and has since fallen to .01. It is currently at .60 and is considered a very risky investment.

I hope this article has given you some of the tools to quickly identify and avoid scams.

Update: Looking up the Company Info on PinkSheets reveals that the company was formerly:
Incorporated in 1997, Gulf Petroleum Exchange is multi-faceted energy company and combines the experience of its people with the strength of its strategic alliances to create profitable projects within three aspects of energy enhancement; oil and gas production, the removal of sulfur compounds from hydrocarbon based fuels and sales of the resultant products.
and is worth, as of the last about $14,000.

posted by Matthew O. Smith @ 7:15 AM 2 comments