[email protected] paypal scammer

Hey Folks,
Thought I'd better add this one. Scam attempted within 24 hours of advertising a car online. The car was advertised for $8500.00, and I was instantly suspicious because a) they offered more than asked b) they 'wanted' to buy it unseen.
The online advertising site helpfully provided the IP address, which, when traced, originated in China .

Hi CoffeeNut!
peter has sent the following message to you:

Hello, i would like to know the present condition of this car, I am willing to offer you $9,000.00 AUD for it, pls let me know if you accept my offer...payment for the car will be made through paypal and pick up will be done
Email address: [email protected]
Internet IP: 199.48.147.42

Please Note - Be aware of Internet Scams - especially ones
which ask to send money to Shipping Agents.
See latest Scams at http://www.scamwatch.gov.au

I replied:

Hi Peter,
Further to my reply to you yesterday, after investigation with various professional internet diagnostic and tunnelling tools I have found out that you are perpetrating a scam.
I have forwarded all of the information I have found out about you and your organisation to Federal Authorities in China, the US and Australia, also the providers of the most common free e-mail services including Microsoft, Yahoo and Google.
It is my fervent wish that you and your collaborators are brought to justice. I expect you will eventually fall victim to a 'sting' operation in the near future. I advise you cease all illegal activity immediately to save yourself a jail term.
Regards,
CoffeeNut

And yes, I was sufficiently annoyed about wasting my time penning a lengthy email earlier to the scammer that I took the time and trouble to report the whole exchange to each of the authorities mentioned. In retrospect it was a mistake to send anything at all back to the scammer once I realised what he/she/it was but I was just so steamed about it .

Welcome to ScamWarners. It is great you realized you were dealing with a scammer. Thank you for posting this information here for others to find and not become a victim.

It gets better.
On average I'm getting 2 scam attempts per day. All from China.
It's pretty easy to spot them:

• They're in a big hurry. Real buyers take their time.
• They ALWAYS use email to communicate, never voice.
• They use 'free' email - never ISP provided.
• Their English often contains grammatical errors that someone who speaks it would never make.
• They use 'pro-forma' emails that show up in search-engine queries as known scams.
• They have various excuses for being unable to access land services(Hydrographer out at sea is a particular favourite).

I just ask the 'possibly ligitimate' requests to call the phone number supplied in the ad from a landline(NOT mobile and definitely not skype) for voice-to-voice communications. Scammers won't do this as phone calls from landlines are:

• Traceable (payphone is a dead giveaway).
• Expensive from another country.
• Recordable (your voice is like a fingerprint).

In addition, it is impossible for a non-speaker to translate, interpret and process speech in real-time, much less construct a spoken reply.

However, the attempts ARE getting better. I would not be surprised if fluent speakers of the Marks(us) language are recruited as professional scam contact agents. This would, however, be a very risky occupation and people who speak your language are likely to be able to make a good living with it legitimately.

I(Hydrographer out at sea is a particular favourite).

We're seeing that a lot lately. Oil rigs are heaving with scammers.

Damn I deleted most of them before noting down the email addresses. I'll post any more here, starting with:

Handerson Elizabeth <[email protected]> IP: 203.122.223.237
Sarah Bleno <[email protected]>
Kate <[email protected]>
Kate <[email protected]>
Stephen Keegan <[email protected]>
Kenneth Mark <[email protected]>
Mikel Morgan < [email protected]> IP: 173.245.64.47 (nonexistent domain)
Conn Brian? <[email protected]> IP: 188.65.76.195 (Moscow)

Now Texting and asking for email response. Sheesh...
?? <[email protected]> ph: +61 000000000
john <[email protected]> ph: +61 000000000
?? <[email protected]> ph: +13 236474057 (china)
?? <[email protected]> ph: +13 124592776 (china)
?? <[email protected]> +447 856008723 (nonexistent spoofed Australian number)

I'll keep the list updated with any new arrivals.