"Forced To Suspend Your Account"

It must be the holiday season.

I got not one, but TWO e-mails yesterday, one from eBay and one from PayPal, telling me that there was fraudulent activity on my accounts and thus I needed to log in and verify my information or they'd be "forced to suspend your account" (IE my account). Conveniently, each e-mail provided a link to take me to the respective "website".

LOL! Yeah, right!

I call: BULL DROPPINGS!

By merely waving my cursor over the link, it was obvious that it was going somewhere other than eBay and PayPal.

Obviously, these jerks must have some successes, because they keep sending this garbage to me, and I keep forwarding them to spoof@paypal.com and/or spoof@ebay.com. The return e-mail always says the same thing, that the message did NOT come from PayPal or eBay.

Look, to protect yourself, NEVER use a link provided in an e-mail. It's easy enough to open a new window and go directly to the website, log in, and check your messages. There is ALWAYS a message if it's a real e-mail.

There's no need to panic, any e-mail that threatens some horrible event, whether it's suspending your privileges, freezing a bank account, or bad luck for the next seven years, is a FAKE!

As always, you don't have to believe me.

In fact, don't believe everything you read or hear, it's just too, too easy to be fooled. Even my own mom got sucked in on a phishing (fake) e-mail. Luckily, just after she finished putting her info in, she realized what she'd done and called me. I was able to jump into her account and change the passwords before the thieves did, so all was well...

Sigh. Thank God Mom is a smart woman!

eBay Protection Tutorial: http://pages.ebay.com/help/tutorial/accountprotection/js_tutorial.html
PayPal Security Center: https://www.paypal.com/us/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_security-center-outside

The IRS Has A Refund For You!!

Yup, came right in my e-mail yesterday.

The IRS has found some extra money for me, and all I had to do was send an e-mail with my personal information (the link was conveniently provided to me) and I'd get my refund ASAP.

DANG, do these clowns think I fell off the turnip truck?

First off, the IRS will NEVER admit they owe you money. Come on, people, think!! Since when do the Feds give up a nickel without a mass of extra paperwork, at least an hour of your time, and an argument?

PULEEZE, I call BULL DROPPINGS on this e-mail.

It's just some cousin of the poor Christian woman who's dying of cancer and wants to send you all of her money, if you'll just give her your bank account information. Or the guy that wants to buy your car/furniture/electronics and he'll be happy to send you a money order plus shipping -- all you have to do is send the shipper's fee over to his thief-in-law...

In EVERY case, I can promise you that you'll end up owing the bank a bunch of money, whether it's having your account stripped clean with ACH withdrawals, or when they back that fake money order out of your account.

Don't be a fool out on the Internet! Just because someone says it's true, doesn't mean it is!

In fact, doubt me too.

But be warned, if you ignore me, you will be sorry....

IRS Website: www.irs.gov