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Look out for this one:

yourdelivery at dpd.co.uk < personal handle at hotmail.com>
We didn't find you...
Your parcel is now back in our Warehouse.
We tried to deliver your parcel today but you weren't in or there was no safe place to leave it. And because of Coronavirus pandemic, we can't leave it to your neighbour. You need to schedule a new delivery.

Your parcel: 06693674767498

TIP: Next time get our app and never miss a parcel delivery.

.
I could tell it was a scam only by the odd clearly private sender address after yourdelivery at dpd.co.uk and the oddly worded 'tip'.
Most scams fail at first glance, this took two, and yes I did check the tracking number to make sure, but didn't use any link provided. As scams go its a dangerous one as there was nothing in the email to get me to not believe it, and I get delivery and failed delivery messages all the time.

What was most concerning was when I reported this to report at phishing.gov.uk I got this reply:

Delivery has failed to these recipients or groups:
report at phishing.gov.uk
A problem occurred during the delivery of this message. Please try to resend the message later.


Diagnostic information for administrators:
Generating server: .....
report at phishing.gov.uk
Remote Server returned '533 5.4.0 Your message seems to have triggered our junk email filters. Could you edit your message and try again?'
Original message headers:......

WTF if you copy paste and send a scam email with a succinct one line forward to the Nation Cyber Crime Agency on the address used for the purpose it gets spam filtered!! I thought these were a professional government body. facepalm

Please folks, pass this on to your crumblies and assorted other old folks.

It’s easy for us to be savvy, but scammers prey on the naive and credulous. That’s not a dig at old persons, just a true statement of the scammer’s aims.

Oldies and scams

I see a lot of scams and 99% are not worth posting about.
I specifically mentioned this one here because it was the most convincing scam I have seen so far. I had to actively check to be sure it wasn't legit, and I am fairly scam savvy.
The other scam I posted on Dakka was unsual because it wasnt really a scam, just a straight up theft as attempts were made to remove money from my fathers bank account under false pretences without him ever engaging the scammer. My dad is well old but also reasonably scam savvy.


The failed posts

Something odd about the post, it failed to load properly four times, as currently visible. This is due to a change in font.

The dpd.co.uk was in Times Roman and didn't load, nor did anything after it load. At first I thought I had not sufficiently denatured an email link, it was broken but still contained the at sign.. The text was copied from my Discord page where it loaded ok. Dakka admin, will a font change cause a post to disappear?

This might also help.

https://www.dpd.co.uk/content/about_dpd/phishing.jsp

Thank you, I did see that page when checking up.
The dpd logo, or the read x in a white box where the logo was on my page contained a hidden hyperlink to an address in India.

The variant of the scam I received had no warning of shipping fees. But did hint I should download an app. Presumably the payload of the scam is the app which would phish my financial details and passwords.
There was no link to the app on the email, so it appears the scammer would wait until you ask for one.

I "like" this thinking, its a fairly subtle scam as it gets the victim to initiate the subprocesses. You don't just contact the scammer and ask for help you contact the scammer with an agenda to get and upload an app, to use themselves, so the victim is more involved with the process and easier to walk down a path they wouldnt want to go.

You gotta be pretty damn low to pull a fast one like this on some old person who might already be struggling to get by. But, criminals as a rule tend to prey on the weak (no offense to old people) and always have, I suppose.

Yeah. Standard scam advice for others.

If even slightly suspicious, do not follow a link offered, or call a number given etc.

Just go your App Store, their genuine website and get your numbers and info from those.

And remember, the stereotypical dodgy spelling and grammar is deliberate. Helps them target the less educated, those less likely to smell a rat before the deed is done.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 ZergSmasher wrote:
You gotta be pretty damn low to pull a fast one like this on some old person who might already be struggling to get by. But, criminals as a rule tend to prey on the weak (no offense to old people) and always have, I suppose.

Mate. There’s scumbags in the U.K. sending fake NHS emails for the COVID vaccine, asking for card details.

Scammers do not give an eff. They just want your money.

Selfishness knows no borders.

At any rate, straight from the get go the wording is unprofessional. No legitimate company will word a sentence or email like that, it just isn't the sort of phrasing or language they use.

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
At any rate, straight from the get go the wording is unprofessional. No legitimate company will word a sentence or email like that, it just isn't the sort of phrasing or language they use.

Yep, definitely a heavy non-English speaker vibe going on there.

A lot comes from India, including this scam.

Contrary to what Mad Doc says a lot of scammers have bad English. Yes some spelling is deliberately poor for tactical reasons but a lot of the call centre scammers have poor English and/or are lazy with their presentation. I don't think its all a ploy to weed out the aware.
As many genuine companies outsource call centres to India anyway that isn't as big a clue as it might at first seem.

Jim Browning mentions the presentation frequently, and doesn't seem to think its a ploy. If you haven't watched any of his videos search the name on YouTube and watch them. Very entertaining and eye opening work he does, a hero of the internet.




Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:

 ZergSmasher wrote:
You gotta be pretty damn low to pull a fast one like this on some old person who might already be struggling to get by. But, criminals as a rule tend to prey on the weak (no offense to old people) and always have, I suppose.

Mate. There’s scumbags in the U.K. sending fake NHS emails for the COVID vaccine, asking for card details.

Scammers do not give an eff. They just want your money.

The one that got my goat was the scumbag who went to a vulnerable person stuck them with a needle and claimed it was the Covid vaccine, scammed them out of £160 and went back for £100 and a second vaccine the next week. I would happily see that mans crimes tattooed on his forehead.

 Orlanth wrote:
A lot comes from India, including this scam.

Contrary to what Mad Doc says a lot of scammers have bad English. Yes some spelling is deliberately poor for tactical reasons but a lot of the call centre scammers have poor English and/or are lazy with their presentation. I don't think its all a ploy to weed out the aware.
As many genuine companies outsource call centres to India anyway that isn't as big a clue as it might at first seem.

Jim Browning mentions the presentation frequently, and doesn't seem to think its a ploy. If you haven't watched any of his videos search the name on YouTube and watch them. Very entertaining and eye opening work he does, a hero of the internet.




Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:

 ZergSmasher wrote:
You gotta be pretty damn low to pull a fast one like this on some old person who might already be struggling to get by. But, criminals as a rule tend to prey on the weak (no offense to old people) and always have, I suppose.

Mate. There’s scumbags in the U.K. sending fake NHS emails for the COVID vaccine, asking for card details.

Scammers do not give an eff. They just want your money.

The one that got my goat was the scumbag who went to a vulnerable person stuck them with a needle and claimed it was the Covid vaccine, scammed them out of £160 and went back for £100 and a second vaccine the next week. I would happily see that mans crimes tattooed on his forehead.

At times like these I miss some hard core citizen justice..
Criminals are the lowest of the low... Why can we not just purge in holy fire? :(

We'd lose a third the population. A LOT of people are simply not good people. And that is assuming we had a magical way of making that somehow happen.

Personally I feel the answer to your core question is simply that society tolerates it. We are generally willing to not hold individuals accountable for their misdeeds most of the time. Commonly this is little things, but the tolerance of little things adds up to permitting increasingly larger ones, and in the end it is mainly just the sudden extremes which are actively punished. That said the hows and whys are very complicated, the costs benefits and realities which lead to this circumstance are an immense discussion of their own.

Commonly the best you can do is be the change you want to see, and refuse to tolerate bad behavior as much as you reasonably can.

 Orlanth wrote:

The one that got my goat was the scumbag who went to a vulnerable person stuck them with a needle and claimed it was the Covid vaccine, scammed them out of £160 and went back for £100 and a second vaccine the next week. I would happily see that mans crimes tattooed on his forehead.

Some good news

https://news.sky.com/story/covid-19-man-charged-with-assault-after-woman-92-injected-with-fake-coronavirus-vaccine-12188770

They caught this alleged bastard.

Out of curiosity, what were they trying to get you to do? Click on a link in the email or download the scam app?

 Grey Templar wrote:
Out of curiosity, what were they trying to get you to do? Click on a link in the email or download the scam app?

I think I was expected to panic, call them and ask for the app. There was an image which didn't load, but was a hyperlink, so it would be the3 false corporate logo with a click instruction.
The more you get the victim to act the more they feel in control and not duped.

 Grey Templar wrote:
Out of curiosity, what were they trying to get you to do? Click on a link in the email or download the scam app?

It likely varies. Might be all they want is you to call them or use an app and give them financial data they can use; or just get you to send money to them through various means (direct band transfer - paypal payment - western union - gift cards*). Or perhaps they want to get you download a hijack virus that either monitors your PC and steals data or locks you out and suddenly you've got to pay to unlock your pc etc... Basically the scam email is a hook - what happens after that can vary.



*Yep they will do that. Often wrapping it up like "Oh an amazon gift card is like a money transfer now; plus we can do it today right now and get you your parcel; otherwise you'll have to wait 4 weeks and it will cost more too" kind of lines. There's some videos on youtube showing the same idea done with tax payments and the like. It sounds really outlandish, but its easier to dupe people who are not internet aware and who might also be from an older generation who are not as aware of what giftcards are for internet shops and what "amazon" is etc...

I have a buyer who wants to split payment across two cards. That is, make two separate paypal payments for an item. Is this a scam?

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Mate. There’s scumbags in the U.K. sending fake NHS emails for the COVID vaccine, asking for card details.

Scammers do not give an eff. They just want your money.

Scumbags can be from anywhere, but the reason they seem to disproportionately come from India is the law doesn't put pressure on them. If you run a scam out of the UK, US, Australia, etc. and people find out, the law will come a knocking and there'll be consequences. In India, people have gone to the extent of tracking down call centres to the building if not the specific office and when the police are informed, it's unlikely anything will come of it.

 Irkjoe wrote:
I have a buyer who wants to split payment across two cards. That is, make two separate paypal payments for an item. Is this a scam?

Is it like, the item costs 30 so they want to make one payment of 17 and one payment of 13? If so that's relatively normal, people do do this when splitting gift card/credit card payments all the time. Just make sure you have the full payment value before you send the item.

It's 1800 in two payments of 900. I was afraid he would claim double payment or something, just seemed odd to me.

If it’s that large an amount, probably credit limits. Ask them to do 890 & 910, then it definitely can’t be mistaken for a double payment.

 NinthMusketeer wrote:

 Irkjoe wrote:
I have a buyer who wants to split payment across two cards. That is, make two separate paypal payments for an item. Is this a scam?

Is it like, the item costs 30 so they want to make one payment of 17 and one payment of 13? If so that's relatively normal, people do do this when splitting gift card/credit card payments all the time. Just make sure you have the full payment value before you send the item.

It could be for falsification of customs or duties. If goods are under a certain value they do not acrue tax. By splitting the payment across two cards then declaring one and ignoring the other one generates a partial paper trail that fits the item and is difficult to disprove. Two payments on one system will not be as secure for the tax evader.
If this happens to you it is not on your head, there is no law against you collecting payment from more than one source. The fraud, if any, is happening outside your control. Also credit limits are a thing so there is a plausible explanation.

Also there is one doing the rounds for Virgin Media phone lines. Keep an ear out for that phone call.