Here's a new one for me... which is actually fairly surprising since I have received about a zillion copies each of many of the dumbest spam and malware messages on the Internet, each as if they are new idea never tried before...
Like the 'teacher's aide' from some odd little school IN Texas who asked me (and many, many, many, many others) if I would be so nice as to post a link to some obscure page on some obscure website because 'the kids' would be so excited to see 'their' link on my website... ::) I actually found a number of people including an official website for an actual city in Oregon had gone and posted 'the kids' link... because, sure... who wouldn't want to make 'the kids' happy!?!
Well... me, I guess. I actually replied to 'Betty' or 'Karen' or whatever 'her' name was in this version by asking her how the commute every morning from the Chicago area to TEXAS and back went for her?!? I mean, that's some commute!!!
If she really IS a teacher's aide in TEXAS what is 'she' doing sending me email from a business IP address in suburban Illinois?? Weird... ;D
So, back to this latest new one. It's actually pretty clever. Maybe genius... I don't know, you be the judge.
Here I am a conservation director for 2 bass federations and I get an email today from: "Planet Planet < chris . unfccc30 @ outlook . com>
Yes, that's a little odd but it doesn't immediately look like **WARNING SPAM MALWARE DANGER BEWARE** as many of the email I receive every day does.
I was distracted from it quickly by the subject: "Deforestation & Desertification" which is not your typical spammer/malware approach. I mean, I get nerdy, real environmental email similar to this pretty much every day...
Followed immediately by an attachment (a danger bell sounds dimly in the back of my brain, but I get real email with attachments pretty regularly too!). It's a PDF though which quiets the bells momentarily, plus it titled something like "Ecology _Society . PDF - really, when has a spammer/malware attack used those words.
It actually starts to look like this might be something new and in my wheelhouse so to speak... The actual email message is short and doesn't sound dangerous either:
"Dear Sir/Madam,
Please review the attached and contact Prof. Paul Jones.
Regards,
Jessica Bagley."
Wait a minute...
Prof. Paul Jones?? Do I know him? Have I heard of him? Is this something new, or something I forgot about??
Luckily, my Internet reflexes tend to be purposefully slow most of the time because:
- Why would 'Jessica Bagley' send me an email FROM a totally different name and non-matching email address?? Sure, maybe it is a generic 'institution' email address, but then... 'outlook . com' isn't what I could call an institution email address. After all, I've received plenty of spam and attacks from that very populr FREE email source (and besides, it is ridiculously easy to fake that part of an email message.
- And, why no explanation further? Why no signature...? Actually, NOTHING to tell me any part of who, what, why, when, where?? Smart institution people generally no better than that?
- So, I do what I should always do - I look at the message source and it does appear to truly be from a real Microsoft outlook . com source... but from Microsoft Sweden??
- Okay, even with my way more addled brain I have ZERO recall of a professor from Sweden who has previously been out there somewhere I've seen before on this type of topic.
- Plus, are all PDF's safe? Oh he-double toothpicks no!!! PDF's can definitely nail you with something that will take a lot more than an antibiotic to get rid of once you've got it!!! (Not sure if everyone on the Internet knows this??) AND, who says it's really a PDF?? It could be something even more nasty 'posing' as a PDF...
So, after looking at it from a little farther (a safe distance from my computer screen), and thinking it through a couple minutes, I'm pretty sure I don't want to TOUCH this email OR especially the mystery attachment. I have a growing feeling something really bad will happen... something I won't enjoy at all no matter how much security stuff I have on my computer...
I think instead I will risk the wrath of the eminent Prof. Paul Jones, permanently delete the email and live my life knowing I may have passed on some great insight into the real plight of deforestation and desertification. Though... I may wonder a few times for a few minutes... did 'they' just make a stab in the dark with this fairly tricky attempt... or was it really targeted that well at a more likely (supposedly) receptive recipient?? I will probably never know...
Okay... I'm a nerd AND I'm intrigued by this possibly clever attempt to do something bad to me, maybe personally?? (Or that could be just my ego talking...)
I uploaded the PDF file to www.virustotal.com and it, not surprisingly came up 'clean' in 50-some virus engines... I would probably be disappointed if it didn't. After all, someone seems to have put some thought into this one.
But... when I click on the Details tag (some people might think if something scanned by that many virus programs it must be clean, right?) way down at the bottom, not really standing out or flashing in red, anything like that, I see a little caution icon followed by: "Contains an open action to be performed when the document is viewed."
Now that is interesting... because why does the document NEED that?? Maybe to check if you are up-to-date or not with your PDF versions??Maybe... to download something really nasty. I can tell you for sure I AM NOT GOING TO TRY AND FIND OUT!!!
Frankly, with all of the vulnerabilities out there right now, having lots of virus and malware protection, and being up-to-date with all your software updates still cannot protect you from everything that is being tried.
I might open the file and whatever they're trying to do bounces off of me like floating dandelion seeds... or I might find my computer is no longer in my control and be very unhappily trying to buy a new computer and recover as much of my data as I have backed up... not my idea of a good time. So I will just move on and find something else to interest me.
I hope you find this slightly more than boring, and possibly even helpful.
I got a very similar email with a PDF attachment called Forest & Nature from chris.unfcc74@outlook.com. I searched to see if there was any information regarding the email and found your posts on the email you had received. Apparently Jessica has changed her name to Simone but Prof. Jones is still the person to contact.
Attn: Sir/Madam,
Please refer to the enclosed letter and contact Prof. Jones.
Regards,
Simone Bagley
Lately I've been getting really weird automated robot calls that claim I have "serious allegations against me" and that if I don't call back, I'll be arrested. LOL Yeah, like I'm sure the police use robot calls instead of subpoenas and registered mail. And no name is mentioned or any jurisdiction. So I assume if you call back, they offer to "represent" you or tell you what the charges are for a fee. Been getting these for months. Hope they don't catch me. LOLOLOL
Yes... these robo calls of all different types are just completely out of control... if only I could develop that email/telephone automated return bomb that goes back along the line and blows up the true source of this crap...
Meanwhile, I need to answer my door for a moment. A young man wants to ask me about me looking at my Consumers bill to see the outrageous 'illegal' charges they are putting on my bill without my knowledge. I know he is just here to help me... yeah.
After that, I need to take about 8 surveys to help some other people out...
I keep getting calls from your Friends in Lansing about the election coming up. They are Persistent.
Wait. What? Was that Dan Kimmel? The man, the myth, the legend?
I think it's me. I'm wearing his underwear anyways...
I'm not getting a lot of political calls other than surveys from unknown people about the elections who I don't want to talk to. I am getting tons of political email from people I can't even vote for!
They also keep leaving fliers in my mailbox or stuck to my doorknob. Piles of them. Almost seems like there can't be that many people running for office right now?!? Once in awhile they even knock on my door and say, "Hi, I'm so-and-so. Would you please vote for me?" They always say please.