The latest scam - in the last 18 months or so - are emails from friends stuck overseas and needing £5k wired to them urgently.

I received one yesterday and another one about 12 months ago. They are entirely believable.... OK - I've just dug one out, here it is:


"I'm writing this with tears in my eyes, my family and I came down here to Madrid, Spain for a short vacation,unfortunately we were mugged at the park of the hotel where we stayed all cash,credit card and mobile phone were stolen off us but luckily we still have our passports with us.

We've been to the Embassy and the Police here but they're not helping issues at all the bad news is our flight will be leaving in less than 8-hrs from now but we're having problems settling the hotel bills and the hotel manager won't let us leave until we settle the bills.

Am freaked out at the moment! I'll need your help (LOAN) financially of 2,000 Pounds. I promise to make the refund once we get back home. Please let me know if you can help and i need you to keep checking your email because it's the only i can reach you...."

Now the clever thing is that the one above was from an friend of mine who was in Spain - the one before said 'Thailand' from a friend who was in Thailand. So they are believable.

The email addresses were compromised which is how they were able to pull it off and read the reply.

Clever. Bar stewards.


+8 4.8