This morning I got into talking about emails from family or friends that are absolutely fake but we get them all the time. You may have seen them "you will get a check from Microsoft if you forward this email", "Pepsi uses aborted babies in their products"... you get the idea.
Well these emails are trying to do one of three things:
- infect your computer with a virus which can be avoided. (see below)
- scam you for information and bank info
- to cause traffic throughout the internet through chain mail
1. Most people receive email directly to their computer this is like opening up your front door and letting in just anyone and maybe a couple thieves come in with the rest and then they steal stuff from your house. You can't complain you just let them walk in the door. Get an Email at Yahoo, Hotmail, Gmail, Mail.com, or you can even find out if your internet provider has webmail which will allow you to check your email from
anywhere. This way you are not downloading email to your computer which will keep you safe in the long run.
2. You will get emails that say you WON the lottery (got one this morning) stating that such n such company has been collecting email addresses and you won some lottery in some foreign country but they want your private information ... this one I got today even wanted my PIN number for my bank....
3. There are people out there that love to cause havoc and if you don't believe me ask why people create virus's.... So spam like this "send this email to all of your friends and you will get 5c per email" is forwarded over and over again. There is no way to track an email in the manner that they suggest. They do this to clog up the internet mainly to interrupt large companies servers.
If you happen to get any email that asks you to forward it on cause some baby who is extremely sick will get free medical care for every email forwarded check on it before you send it cause most likely its false information http://www.snopes.com/inboxer/medical/cancerbaby.asp this one states that the baby will get 3 cents every time you post it on facebook...
They are trying to appeal to your emotions and get you to spam, spread virus's, make everyone else have a bad day on the internet.... just remember that these people are in some way getting paid millions by you spreading the information for free for them.
checkout www.snopes.com this site is "the definitive internet reference source for urban legends, folklore, myths, rumors, and misinformation"
Chris Long
http://www.thelocalgeeks.com
http://www.facebook.com/thelocalgeeks
http://twitter.com/thelocalgeeks
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