Internet Marketing 101
June 20th, 2003
Hello y'all;
A few thoughts between the hacks and coughs of the flu or a heck of a
cold. I mentioned last week I thought I was catching something, and sure
enough I was.
Whew, this crud took hold and is still wearing me out.
Anyway the other morning I was working on the computer and kept feeling
an itch in my shoulder blade. As I started scratching it I felt a small
bump. Hmmm, come to find out it was a tick.
Ticks get bad this time of the year here in Tennessee like many areas
of the country.
So I plucked it off, doused the spot with some alcohol and kept working,
however it got me to thinking. I started thinking about how the little
bloodsuckers attached themselves (usually unknown to the donor), and then
happily drain their blood.
Geeesh, I've seen farm dogs with so many ticks attached to their ears,
it made me wonder how they could hold their head up. Yet the dog trotted
along seemingly UNAWARE of the violators.
Some of the ticks were swelled bigger than large marbles. Worse than that,
if you tried to pluck one off, it would pop like a balloon, yeah gross
I know.
:-)
Anyway my point is, there are people out wanting to do the same thing
to you.
Yes marketing is about selling goods or services, and making a profit.
But also as marketers we have to be aware of what's going on around us.
We need to be AWARE of our customer needs.
We should be AWARE of what the latest trends are.
We should be AWARE of possible fraud orders being placed with us.
We should be AWARE of scams.
Very late Wednesday night, I received the email shown below:
(I have changed some information to generic info for disclosure reasons.)
==============================================
Dear customer,
Recently we have received an order made by using your personal credit
card information.
This order was made online at our official XXXXXXX website on 06/19/2003.
Our Fraud Department has some suspicions regarding this order and we need
you to visit a special Fraud Department page at our web store where you
can confirm or decline this transaction by providing us with the correct
information.
This e-mail address has been taken from National Credit Bureau.
Click the link below to visit a special Fraud Department page to resolve
the cause of the problem.
XXXXXXX.com/fraud_department.html
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
ORDER# 1095619 - STATUS: SUSPENDED
ITEMS PURCHASED
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Item No: 73890
CDA-9815 In-Dash CD Player/Ai-Changer Controller
Price: $387.65 Qty: 2
Total: $775.30
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The order listed above has not yet been processed.
The reason for the delay in processing your order is:
UNVERIFIED SHIPPING ADDRESS
Information provided:
Shipping 41 Street Name, Ave.
Staten Island, NY 10306
United States
phone# XXX-3X7-9X43
In our effort to deter fraudulent transactions, we need your help in providing
us with the correct information. Your prompt response is needed to avoid
any unauthorized charges to your credit card.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Click the link below to visit a special Fraud Department page to resolve
the cause of the problem.
XXXXXXX.com/fraud_department.html
Sincerely;
Blah, Blah
Such & Such Big Retailer, Inc.
==============================================
Well even though I'm very aware when dealing with possible fraud, this
one really caught my attention.
Especially since it was from a very big name electronic retailer that,
I in fact am going to visit today to buy some additional recording equipment.
I had spent some time on their website earlier this week looking over
various models of some equipment.
I have also made several purchases from them in the past.
However after noting several things I decided it was a scam or sometimes
called "email spoofing" where the email is made to look like
it came from an official person of a legitimate company or service. The
scammer is trying to pull sensitive and personal information from you.
I still decided I would call the retailer the next day to be sure.
Ok, now here are some things I noted:
1. Why didn't they know my name? I mean hey what's this "Dear Customer"
stuff, if you think someone is using my credit card then that means you
should know my name.
2. The sender's email address was not from the retailers domain name,
however it was from one of the big ISPs. Examples being Bellsouth, Earthlink,
AOL, and etc. No it was not a free email address.
3. When I typed in XXXXXXX.com/fraud_department.html in my browser
it could not find the page, but instead returned a 404 error stating the
page could not be found on the retailers site.
4. The XXXXXXX.com/fraud_department.html did not go to that link,
it was redirected to another domain something called instant-credit-(something
or another).org or something similar.
However when clicking on the link in the email and letting it redirect,
I was taken to a site that looked exactly like the retailers site. I mean
an exact copy, except the wording in the center of the page contained
the senders ad copy relating to possible credit card fraud.
All the other links on the page actually went to the legitimate retailers
links. Upon clicking on the link telling me to do so, to prevent possible
fraud of my card, I was carried to another exact duplicate page that contained
a form to fill out my information and verify it was correct.
This was so well done that it actually had me questioning if it might
be valid.
So next I decided to check out the domain name itself (instant-credit-(something
or another).org). I looked up the owner information using http://www.whois.sc
(a great free lookup site for domains) and saw that the info was locked
from prying eyes. The kicker was that the domain had been registered only
a day before me receiving the email.
Geesh, I wasn't born yesterday, if this big name retailer was sending
this email then they sure wouldn't send me to another domain name site
that was just registered yesterday.
Especially considering the nature of the email and the potential problem
involved. Seems to me they would call me by phone, or have me call them.
Anyway, the next morning before calling the retail chain's office, I decided
again to try the link. Guess what, it was shut down and the domain no
longer resolves. So someone must have contacted the retailer and they
had the offending site and scam shut down very quickly.
So folks, watch your step, watch who you send sensitive data too, especially
via situations such as the one described above.
The scammers are getting more polished by the day!
Similar to the tick, these people would love nothing better than to attach
themselves to your credit card and drain it dry.
I hope you have a great weekend!
Send me your comments and/or marketing questions please:
comments@InternetMarketing-101.net
Thanks for joining me and my rambling!
PS: Send your comments and/or marketing questions to:
comments@InternetMarketing-101.net
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