Not many people take full advantage of the fun side of
internet phishing scams, and I must say, they are missing out on some truly satisfying
entertainment.
Back when Al Gore had just invented the internet, the first
professional phishermen were the Nigerians. They were pioneers in the art of internet
skullduggery, so much so that their name is forever associated with the “deposed
king of (insert African country name here), let me share my millions with you,
just give me your banking information” email scam.
Many, many years ago I worked for a company that – and millennials,
you will not believe this, but I swear it’s the truth – had one email address
for the whole company. As the junior engineer, I was the most tech-savvy
(meaning I knew how to spell “tech”), so I was in charge of the account. Every
morning I would fire up the modem (a device that served mainly to make your
internet connection slower than you ever thought imaginable) and log in to our
account, print out the emails (on paper!), and disperse them to my coworkers.
This was back in 1826.
One morning, much to my delight, we received an email from
the son of the (recently murdered in a coup) Crown Prince of Nigeria. He was
anxious to wire me ten million dollars because he would be tragically killed
just like his dad if he was caught with the money. I would hold onto the cash
while he snuck out of his war-ravaged kingdom, then we’d meet here in the U.S.,
split the windfall, and then, presumably, party like rock stars and become BFF’s.
There was just one catch. He had no access to any money, so
it was up to me to front him a little dough to, as he so eloquently put it, “greeze
the palms” of the local banking officials.
I then spent two weeks looking forward to each morning when
I would respond to his emails pretending to be a doddering old fool who was super-excited
about the opportunity but not really sure how to carry out all his complicated
banking instructions.
At some point, right around the time I was asking if I could
come to Nigeria to help with the greezing, and asking him if I could stay at
his house while I was there since I didn’t know if any of the hotels were up to
my standards, I was passed off to the Nigeria Scamming Department Manager. Sadly,
as with most American middle managers, he had less finesse than the low-level scam
starter guy that had initiated contact, and over the next few days the manager guy
became increasingly less patient with me.
He finally ended our budding financial relationship in an
all-caps email demanding to know what the hell was wrong with me and why I
couldn’t follow simple instructions. (Perhaps because I never could quite
figure out what he meant by my “bank account number,” and gave him several
different options, including the bank’s phone number, their address number on
the outside of the building, and also the exact number of accounts the bank
had, after I called the bank manager to inquire.)
I could almost see him banging away on the keyboard in a
spitting rage. It was one of the most delightfully entertaining two weeks of my
life.
I had a few fleeting moments of that same joy yesterday and
today, when I was contacted via phone - from a number in Florida - by the “Google
Gmail Security Team.” A nice gentleman named Dave, with a heavy Indian accent,
explained that my Gmail account had apparently been hijacked by spammers, and
it would be shut down and locked within twenty-four hours if we didn’t fix it
right away.
Oh, my! What a predicament we have found ourselves in!
Especially since Google doesn’t call people. Whatever shall we do?
I kept him on the phone as long as I could, but I was
driving, so I couldn’t take the necessary steps at my computer terminal to secure
my account from the insidious hackers. It turned out he was located in
Wilmington, Delaware, and not Florida, and he seemed to think the weather in
Wilmington was “pretty mild,” that early December day. I guess Dave doesn’t
really understand where Delaware is located.
Sadly, I had an appointment to get to, so I had to ask Dave
for a callback number. He gave me an 800 number that, upon later Googling, could
either have been associated with an opportunity to buy an apartment in Delhi,
or a web design and internet marketing firm in Pasadena. Hmm…
I thought my fun was over, but in a wonderful turn of events,
Dave called back this morning. Great news, Dave! I’m home and can get to my
computer terminal. Let’s fix this vexing issue!
All I had to do was log out of my Gmail, get to my home
screen, hit the Windows key and the letter R simultaneously to bring up the run
command prompt, and simply type in “iexplore 216.115.218.200/505877301”. Once I
did that, we could get this problem solved. He had to get off the line briefly to
get the last string of digits. I guess they don’t always get that far, and he
needed to ask his manager what the code was today.
I told Dave that I typed it all in just like he said, and I
could almost hear him salivating in “Delaware.” He asked what I was seeing,
hoping that I was looking at their screen cloning site located at the 216 IP
address. I told him my screen had gone blank.
Dave, ever the Gmail security professional, had to come up
with a series of blank screen troubleshooting tips while I quizzed him on why
the Google logo was all gray today instead of colored, and how the Wilmington
weather was this morning, and if he was calling me on his old Florida cell
phone, or if their office had been blown down the coast in the last hurricane,
and if he’d ever been out to Topeka, Kansas where the main Google campus is
located, and if so, while he was there, had he tried the world-famous “Google
Burger,” which I had been told was a tofu burger stamped in the letter G, with
red ketchup, yellow mustard, blue lettuce, and green tomatoes, on a gluten-free
ciabatta roll.
After powering down my device didn’t work, an increasingly
frustrated Dave finally accused me of wasting my own time. I assured him that
this was not at all a waste of my time, but he apparently had better things to
do with his day, so he wished me -
what I’m pretty sure was sarcastic - good luck with my soon-to-be frozen Gmail
account.
I thought for sure my fun was over, but lo and behold, ten minutes
later, Steve from Gmail Support called me from the exact same number.
Halleluiah!
I asked how Dave was doing, but it turned out that Steve was
really in Florida, and didn’t know Dave, or anything about a recent call. I
told Steve he needed to contact the folks at Guinness after our call, because
he just set a land speed record, but he had no idea what I was talking about.
It seems Steve was calling because Google noticed that my
Gmail account had apparently been hijacked by spammers, and it would be shut
down and locked within twenty-four hours if we didn’t fix it right away.
Oh, my! What a conundrum, Steve!
I asked if I should get to my run command and type in “iexplore
216.115.218.200/505877301”, but Steve hung up on me before I could finish
reading the number string.
I am currently sitting at my desk praying that I get a call
from Mike who works at Gmail Google Security Support in the greater Florida-Delaware
region.
See you soon,
-Smidge
Copyright © 2018 Marc Schmatjen
Also visit Marc’s Amazon.com Author Page for all his books. Enjoy!
