Government Official’s E-Mail Hacked for Money

A new e-mail scam has victimized a high ranking official of the Ministry of Industry and Primary Resources (Bandar Seri Begawan, Sultanate of Brunei). Actually, scammers hacked his private e-mail and distributed fake messages from it.

The scam message, first expressing hope that the e-mail reached the recipient on time, apologizes for not informing him regarding the sender's visit to Scotland for some function. Thereafter, it states that since the sender has lost his purse that had valuable things and some cash, he's facing problems. The mishap occurred when he was going back to his hotel, the e-mail claims.

The e-mail further says that currently, the hotel management department is holding back his passport and other belongings pending his payment clearance. Therefore, he needs to borrow 1,650 Pounds so as to pay his hotel bills as well as to return home. Eventually, the sender in the e-mail promises that he'll give back the money immediately when he returns home.

Evidently, people receiving the scam message have been urged to remain vigilant and not to fall for the scam.

It's worth noting that the above kind of scam e-mails are targeting famous personalities, including ministers, socialites, celebrities and others across the world.

Lately, the Hotmail account of M.K Shankarlinge, Transport Secretary of Karnataka (India), was similarly hijacked and used to send fraudulent e-mails to his contacts. The e-mails claimed that Shankarlinge was stuck with no money at the airport in London and so requested the recipients for a wire transfer of 3,500 Pounds to his name as an aid.

Thus, to avoid falling prey to such scams, security researchers suggest that users must set separate passwords for separate accounts like e-mail, blog, forum, etc. This'll mean less destruction in case one among all the accounts does get hacked.

Moreover, these passwords must be changed regularly so that chances of having one's login details discovered by hackers are lessened. Furthermore, anyone who suspects he has been scammed should lodge a complaint with the related federal or state agencies. Lastly, he must acquire new credit cards having fresh account numbers after canceling the earlier ones.

Related article: Government Sways in Fresh Data Breach Scandal

» SPAMfighter News - 5/13/2010