In general, we recommend against reporting free email addresses and phone numbers that are used in these scams.
I imagine that there are laws similar to using the US Mail to perpetrate a scam which have similarly serious consequences.
This is not actually the case. The US Postal service is a federal agency that has been empowered to investigate mail fraud and pursue criminal charges. Using the mail to commit fraud actually leaves the criminal open to additional charges. MSN and Google are private corporations. They do not have those powers. Fraud committed using their services is investigated and charged just like any other fraud. The most google or MSN could do is close a user's account and/or file a civil suit for breach of contract (a costly endeavor that is not worth their time or effort.)
But if they close the address and/or phone number, the scammer will just open a new free email address (actually he probably already has it set up) and get a new free phone number. It will take him less than 10 minutes. Then he will continue with his scam. The next target to come along might google his phone number, but unlike you, he won't find us--because the new number won't be reported and listed here yet. So that victim is not going to benefit from the warning, and he or she may be more likely to think everything is ok. In addition, if law enforcement does investigate, it is far easier for them to connect crimes when the scammer continues to use the same email/phone #. If the scammer changes, law enforcement may not be able to connect all of the scammer's crimes. If they are able to connect them, it will likely take significantly more time and resources to establish that connection.
We kill websites because they cost the scammers time and money, and their existence lends credibility to the scam. In
some cases, we do report email addresses, generally if they aren't free or if the scammer has spent a lot of time spamming/promoting an address, because then he will lose all of the work he did in promoting the address and will be forced to start all over again. But when that isn't the case, the value of a posted warning is generally high enough to leave it alone.
While there are sometimes differing opinions on this topic, we have taken this position because we have found it to be the most beneficial.
