Scammers Spam Fuel Discounts Claiming to Cut Gas Bills

Spammers have pounded on soaring prices of petrol by offering fake fuel discounts to the US residents.

According to security researchers, the new spam redirects the recipient via a link to a 70% discount offer on every gallon of the liquid fuel, as reported by SCMagazine on May 13, 2008.

Reports received say that the spam is from a person who calls himself, 'Gas Saver.'

Security vendors and researchers are warning that the spam surge is flooding the Internet with numerous duplicates of the message, forcing users to receive them.

Spam is more often a commercial advertising to promote dubious products, quasi-legal services, or get-rich-quick schemes. It also means very little cost for the sender, as the messages' carriers or their recipients absorb most of it. However, according to researchers the latest form of spamming is slightly unusual.

Meanwhile, security company, McAfee, has reported that the new fuel discount scam at the moment does not even account for 0.2% of the total spam, although it is likely to grow if the fuel's price goes on rising during the summer, as reported by WhatPC? on May 12, 2008.

Jeremy Gilliat, Researcher at McAfee, commented that in the wake of rising oil prices, it is hardly astonishing that a scammer is trying to sell an item that claims to bring down gas bills, as reported by WhatPC? On May 12, 2008.

While in the latest spam scam, fraudsters are offering discounts, in the end week of April 2008, security software provider, Websense. reported a different spam scam. In that, spammers applied an automated procedure to create fake pages on Google's Blogger service, emphasizing the declining efficacy of security software designed to halt bulk account registrations.

Remarking on various spamming ways to entice traffic to spammers' malicious Websites and getting people to click on harmful links, Sumeet Prasad, Threat Analyst, Websense,presented his observation on the company's blog. He wrote that in the end week of April 2008, spammers were incorporating these redirecting links in various spam campaigns instead of using their original spam domains, as reported by NETWORKWORLD. Prasad added that spammers employ this technique to escape detection by anti-spam software.

Related article: Scammers Exploit Tax System Resulting in ID Theft

» SPAMfighter News - 5/17/2008