"Polish fine art studio" scam

Is this a money mule scam? A package reshipping scam? Something else? It's certainly a scam.. perhaps an art scam designed to process fraudulently obtained artwork. Jennifer's "from" address says "Max" and the email originates from 189.68.40.112 in Brazil.

Subject: I'm looking for somebody to replace me, A

Hello. I am really sorry to bothering you. I am going to get married and leaving to my husband to Cyprus. I have been working with a reliable partner from Poland for 2 years. I had an additional income of 2.000$-4.000$ per month. Because I am not going to live in the USA I offer my friends to cover this position. I have sent emails to all contacts in my address-book. In the USA I was a representative of a Polish fine art studio. I'm not an artist and don't know a lot about it. I controlled pictures acceptance and customers' payments. I got rejected pictures and then I was sending them to other customers with discounts. Sometimes I had to do little things. 2% turnover award fee is usually was paid in addition to $2000.00 month earning , to keep the team spirit. Before Christmas I earned over $5.000,00. If you are interested, please send your CV and Cover Letter directly to the manager at e-mail vitoldklepatski73@gmail.com . I'll be very pleased if you or somebody of your relatives or friends get this position, but not a strange person from an employment agency. When I first walked in it seemed to me that this work is very difficult, but it is not like that, this is very easy job and they showed and taught me everything about my job, and it took me 2 days to learn. People are very nice there and helpful. I think you don't have to miss an opportunity like this. My Best Regards to you my friends and I hope your had a great holidays.
Good luck! Jennifer

Amusing 419 from "EFCC Investigation Office Nigeria"

A novel take on the 419 scam:

Subject: DID YOU AUTHORIZE MR. JOHN WHEELER FOR YOUR FUND CLAIMS
From: Mooreh Rose {mrsrosemooreh44@yahoo.com.hk}
Date: Tue, January 20, 2009 10:51 am

- Attention; Beneficiary, I am Mrs. Rose Moore (Assistance) Chairman from Efcc Investigation Office Nigeria, there is presently a counter claims on your funds by one MR.JOHN WHEELER, who is presently trying to make us believe that you are dead and even explained that you entered into an agreement with him, to help you in receiving your fund, So here comes the big question. Did you sign any Deed of Assignment in favor of (JOHN WHEELER). thereby making him the current beneficiary
with his following account details: MR JOHN WHEELER, AC/NUMBER: 6503809428. ROUTING/122006743, B/NAME:CITI BANK, ADDRESS:NEW YORK,USA, we shall proceed to issue all payments details to the said Mr. John Wheeler, if we do not hear from you within
the next two working days from today Thanks Mrs. Rose Moore (Assistance) Chairman Efcc Investigation Office Nigeria

Clearly if I was dead then I wouldn't be reading the email. Just to wind this particular scammer up, I replied with the one word "yes". That should confuse them.

Originating IP is 83.138.172.72 which seems to be a favourite with 419ers.

Spamcop.net phish

Here's a phish being sent to Spamcop webmail users - the approach has also been used for other webmail systems, so it isn't just Spamcop being targeted:

Subject: UPDATE YOUR SPAMCOP.NET ACCOUNT NOW
From: "spamcop.net webmail update" {info@yahoo.com}

Dear spamcop.net E-mail owners,

This message is from spamcop.net messaging center to all our email account
owners.
We are currently upgrading our data base and e-mail center due to an unusual
activities identified in our email system. We are de-activating all unused
spamcop.net accounts to create space for new accounts. To prevent your account
from being de-activated, you will have to verify your webmail account by
confirming your Webmail identity So that we will know that it's presently a
used account. We have been sending this notice to all our email account owners
and this is the last notice/verification exercise.

CONFIRM YOUR EMAIL IDENTITY BELOW
Last Name: ...........
Username: .......... .
Password : ...........

YOU ARE REQUIRED TO SEND THESE DETAILS TO THE UPDATE TEAM BY SIMPLY
REPLYING TO THIS EMAIL WITH THE REQUESTED DETAILS.

Warning!!! Account owners who fails to update his or her account on receiving
this notice might loose his or her account.

Warning Code:VX2G99AAJ.spamcop.net
Thank you.
"SPAMCOP.NET IT TEAM"

Replying to the email gives a reply-to address of account_up_grade@hotmail.com and the originating IP is 216.241.36.13.

MS09-001 prognosis. Install it now? Leave it for later?

It's patch Tuesday again, with just a single update from Microsoft: MS09-001.

If you are administering a corporate network, then the question that you probably ask yourself each week is "do I need to patch my servers"?

The prognosis for this one seems to be.. "maybe". Microsoft's own bulletin summary gives MS09-001 an exploitability index of "3 - Functioning exploit code unlikely". But the flaw itself is rated "Critical" and could lead to remote code execution.. so there is a low probability of a very serious exploit.

It turns out that it is much more likely that an attempted attack using MS09-001 would blue screen the target system - and that is more likely to be a worry, especially on delicate servers. The Microsoft Security blog has a good writeup and recommends the following priorities:

In terms of prioritizing the deployment of this update, we recommend updating SMB servers and Domain Controllers immediately since a system DoS would have a high impact. Other configurations should be assessed based on the role of the machine. For example, non-critical workstations could be considered lower priority assuming a system DoS is an acceptable risk. Systems with SMB blocked at the host firewall could also be updated more slowly.

Some further reading gives mixed signals: Sophos labels this as a medium threat, SC Magazine reports differing opinions, ZDnet also mentions the denial of service risk, ISC rates it as "Critical" but not "Patch now".

Given that it doesn't take long for the bad guys to implement an exploit for these flaws, and the recent well-publicised spread of the Downadup / Conficker worm then perhaps Microsoft's advice is very pertinent - start by protecting those systems that would suffer the most if they crashed, but there is perhaps not the urgency of the MS08-067 patch that came late last year.

"SLG-Logistics Company" scam

Not to be confused with the legitimate S L G Logistics Ltd based in the UK, "SLG-Logistics Company" is a wholly bogus outfit, probably offering a job in money laundering, parcel reshipping or another criminal enterprise.

Originating IP is 87.205.253.77 in Poland, "from" address is Singapore and doesn't match the name or address in the email. A pretty poor attempt overall.

Subject: Job opportunity
From: "Elma Ford" ncbk@pacific.net.sg

Hi, if you are interested in a well-paid part-time(2-3 hours a day) job in a large transportation & logistics company please contact me at e-mail:
pammorrison366@hotmail.com

With best regards,
Pamela Morrison,
Project manager,
SLG-Logistics Company.

Ongoing injection attacks against Chinese domains

This looks like a case of the Chinese hacking the Chinese again, with a very large number of domains being injected into legitimate sites. Two IPs to block are 121.14.152.154 and 59.34.197.15. For most companies outside of AsiaPac it may well be feasible to block or monitor all traffic to .cn domains.

The following domains are being used in the injection attacks (there are probably many others in a similar format):

• Aznylsf.cn
• Bznylsf.cn
• Ccswzx3.cn
• Ccswzx9.cn
• Cznylsf.cn
• Eqw002.cn
• Eqw003.cn
• Eqw004.cn
• Eqw006.cn
• Eqw008.cn
• Eqw009.cn
• Eznylsf.cn
• Falaliee.cn
• Falaliii.cn
• Falalioo.cn
• Falaliqq.cn
• Falalitt.cn
• Fznylsf.cn
• Gznylsf.cn
• Hhj2.cn
• Hhj3.cn
• Hryspac.cn
• Hryspah.cn
• Hryspan.cn
• Hryspao.cn
• Hryspap.cn
• Hryspaq.cn
• Hryspav.cn
• Hznylsf.cn
• Iznylsf.cn
• Jym562.cn
• Jzll-1.cn
• Jzll-2.cn
• Jzll-4.cn
• Jzll-9.cn
• Jznylsf.cn
• Kznylsf.cn
• Rxgsslla.cn
• Rxgsslld.cn
• Rxgsslll.cn
• Rxgssllt.cn
• Sllanmb.cn
• Sllbnmb.cn
• Slldnmb.cn
• Sllinmb.cn
• Sznylsf.cn
• Tznylsf.cn
• Vvk2.cn
• Wrmfwa.cn
• Wrmfwb.cn
• Wrmfwc.cn
• Wrmfwd.cn
• Wrmfwe.cn
• Wrmfwf.cn
• Wrmfwg.cn
• Wrmfwi.cn
• Wrmfwj.cn
• Wrmfwl.cn
• Wrmfwn.cn
• Wrmfwo.cn
• Wrmfwp.cn
• Wrmfwq.cn
• Wrmfwt.cn
• Wrmfwu.cn
• Wrmfwz.cn
• Wxjyb.cn
• Wznylsf.cn
• Xznylsf.cn
• Yznylsf.cn
• Zdq004.cn
• Zdq005.cn
• Zdq009.cn
• Zdq010.cn
• Zgcgsslle.cn
• Zgcgssllf.cn
• Zghncsa.cn
• Zghncsi.cn
• Zghncsj.cn
• Zghncsl.cn
• Zghncsm.cn
• Zghncsp.cn
• Zghncsr.cn
• Zghncst.cn
• Zgynkmb.cn
• Zgynkmd.cn
• Zgynkmf.cn
• Zgynkmg.cn
• Zgynkmk.cn
• Zgynkms.cn
• Zznylsf.cn

"Dating Service" bogus job offer

This is most likely a money mule operation, or perhaps one of those sophisticated scams where the bad guys recruit a whole virtual office staff to run the scam for them. Either way, avoid at all costs.

Subject: Available positions for new year. Reg.ID: SGF-SF7S8

To Your Attention,

Dating Service announces new job openings in 2009:

Part time employment is now available in our company for USA people.

Feel free to request an application by e-mailing us only at: Dating.Srvc@gmail.com

Best Regards,
Dating Service

"Your new e-mail has been successfuly added" PayPal phish

A slightly different approach from the usual PayPal phish rubbish:

Subject: Your new e-mail has been successfuly added
From: "service@paypal.com" noreply@vodafone.net

Dear PayPal member,

You have added joemontgo85@sbcglobal.net as a new email address for your PayPal account.

If you did not authorize this change, check with family members and others who may have access to your account first. If you still feel that an unauthorized person has changed your email, submit the form attached to your email in order to keep your original email and restore your PayPal account.


Thank you for using PayPal!
The PayPal Team

Please do not reply to this email.
This mailbox is not monitored and you will not receive a response.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Copyright © 1999-2009 PayPal. All rights reserved.

PayPal Email ID PP007

Quite when PayPal started to send email from a vodafone.net account passed me by. The phish jumps through two legitimate but compromised web sites at ol4b.com and imuze.co.uk before it hits a standard PayPal phishing page. It looks like joemontgo85@sbcglobal.net might be consistent for this spam run though.

"podmena traffica test" spam

There seem to be some strange spam emails doing the rounds, with a body text of "podmena traffica test".. what gives?

It makes a bit more sense if you transliterate it into Cyrillic, which leaves you with a Russlish phrase "подмена трафика тест" and that simply translates as "spoofing traffic test".

The subject is a random spammy one, the originating IP looks like part of a botnet.

I'm pretty sure these are coming through "to" and "from" the same email address, so it may well be someone enumerating mailservers looking for SMTP spoofing protection.. in other words, testing addresses to see if they work and then recording the server's SMTP response.

Why? Who knows.. spammers don't usually care about efficiency if they are using a botnet, because they are not paying for bandwidth or equipment. These type of "probes" are seen sometimes and can be safely deleted.

SQL injection: msngk6.ru, dft6s.kz and mcuve.cn

A new bunch of domains being used in SQL injection attacks at the moment:

• www.msngk6.ru
• www.dft6s.kz

These are calling a script called style.js and follow on from these, most likely the work of the Asprox gang. The registration details are probably fake, but for the record are:

domain: MSNGK6.RU
type: CORPORATE
nserver: ns2.msngk6.ru. 75.63.155.106
nserver: ns3.msngk6.ru. 146.57.249.100
nserver: ns1.msngk6.ru. 76.240.151.177
nserver: ns4.msngk6.ru. 24.247.215.75
state: REGISTERED, DELEGATED
person: Aleksandr A Zamaraev
phone: +7 495 7412992
e-mail: zamaraev@namebanana.net
registrar: NAUNET-REG-RIPN
created: 2008.12.17
paid-till: 2009.12.17
source: TC-RIPN

The domain mcuve.cn is different, calling 1.js. This is related to the recent 17gamo.com domain which exploits a number of things including this recent IE7 vulnerability.

Check your proxy logs for .cn/1.js and .ru/style.js plus .kz/style.js to keep on top of these. It is often worth monitoring all traffic to .cn, .ru and .kz domains for manual review.

Asprox SQL injections are back

The Silent Noise blog reports that a fresh round of SQL injection attacks by the Asprox crew are under way. They seem to be using a variety of .ru and .kz domain names, although at the moment they all redirect to 79.135.168.18 in the Lebanon.. the whole 79.135.168.* block is pretty bad and has been covered here before.

inetnum: 79.135.168.0 - 79.135.168.255
netname: LB-NET
descr: Lebanon private dedicated service
country: LB
admin-c: MHB1111-RIPE
tech-c: MHB1111-RIPE
remarks: abuse mailbox: moh.b@lubnannetworks.biz
status: ASSIGNED PA
mnt-by: SISTEM-NET-MNT
source: RIPE # Filtered

person: Mohamed Baga
address: Basha Garden bldg, 5th floor LB
address: Jisr El Bacha Main Road
address: Beirut - Lebanon
e-mail: moh.b@lubnannetworks.biz
remarks: abuse mailbox: moh.b@lubnannetworks.biz
phone: +961 1 512341
nic-hdl: MHB1111-RIPE
source: RIPE # Filtered

route: 79.135.160.0/19
descr: Sistemnet Telecom
origin: AS44097
mnt-by: Sistem-Net-MNT
source: RIPE # Filtered

The endpoint appears to be a PDF exploit running on 79.135.168.18 - it's worth blocking or checking for anyaccess to this server, and also check your logs for accesses to ".kz/style.js" and ".ru/style.js" too.

Currently active domains are:

• www.bnmd.kz
• www.nvepe.ru
• www.mtno.ru
• www.wmpd.ru

Some notable impacted sites:

• frontweb.vuse.vanderbilt.edu (Vanderbilt University)
• maryvillecollege.edu (Maryville College)
• guildford.ac.uk (Guildford University)
• many .gov.ar (Argentina) and .gov.cn (China) sites
• navigationusa.com (Online retailer)
• worldcricketstore.com (Online retailer)

A Google search and Yahoo search indicate the extent of the problem (obviously, you don't want to visit any of these impacted sites).

"Classmates Info Center": Currently planning the 2009 Year Reunion

There's a fake "Classmates" email being spammed out, that leads to a fake video that needs a fake "Adoble Media Player" called Adobe_Player10.exe and as you would probably guess, at the end of all this fakery is a nasty trojan.

---

Subject: Currently planning the 2009 Year Reunion
From: "Classmates Info Center" personalvideo@classmates.com

Your Classmates Events: Reunion January 16th 2009

" With pride and joy we invite you to share a special day in our lives and join us
for the Class Reunion on Friday, January 16th 2009.
Bring the gang from Our High School back together again!
Great party - from start to finish! "

Proceed to view details:

http://video.classmates.logon.user-gandy3ts0.updateyourplayer.com/messages.htm?/identification/INVITATION=vvffx2dckssqnle



Your favorite people are already here, so use ClassmatesTM to bring them together.

With best regards, Josh Jacobson. Customer Service Department.
Copyright 1995-2008 Classmates Online, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

---

The landing page looks like this:


Detection rates are poor according to VirusTotal. ThreatExpert's report is right here. It installs a rootkit and does all sorts of nasty things. Avoid.

Beijing AUG Networks Technology Co / augnetworks.cn scam

This is certainly spam.. but is it a scam? Most likely..

Subject: Dynamoo Domain name and Internet keyword Registration
From: "tom.xu"

Dec 19, 2008

Dynamoo

Domain name & Internet keyword

Dear Sir/Madam,

We are Beijing AUG Networks Technology Co., Ltd which is the domain name and internet keyword registration service company in China. We received a formal application from a company who is applying to register " dynamoo " as their domain name and Internet keyword on Dec 16, 2008.Since through our investigation we found that this word has been in use by your company, and this may involve your company name or trade mark so we inform you in no time. If you consider the domain name and internet keyword are important to your company and it is necessary to protect them by registering them first, contact us soon.

Kind Regards,

Tom Xu

Registration Comissioner

Tel/fax: +86-10-82797446

Email: tom.xu@augnetworks.cn

Website: www.augnetworks.cn

augnetworks.cn was only registered on 23/11/2008 to "Beijing AUG Networks Co", it is in no way an official registrar and the company probably doesn't even exist. Domain registrars are not actually responsible for checking trademarks, they most likely have had no such approach from a customer and really the whole thing is designed to make you panic into buying something you don't need.

There's more on Chinese domain malpractice here.

MS08-078: Out-of-band patch for IE coming

Microsoft are issuing an out-of-band patch tomorrow (17th December) for the well-publicised flaw in Internet Explorer. This is another one of those "patch now" things - see here for more details.

"IE 7 users: stop looking at porn now!"

This zero day vulnerability in Internet Explorer has already been very widely publicised. There are no effective workarounds for the problem until Microsoft patch it.. apart from using a different browser.

The aptly named Zero Day blog has this sage piece of advice: "IE 7 users: stop looking at porn now!" Simply put, randomly surfing for smut, warez, illegal torrents or anything like that* is likely to infect your machine if you are running IE.

In fact, because there's no such thing as a safe site you should consider ditching IE altogether. If you're running Windows then probably one of the safest things you can do is get Firefox, add the NoScript extension and then ensure that your PC is fully up-to-date by using the Secunia Software Inspector. Even security firms such as CA and Trend Micro have had their sites compromised to serve up malware in the past, so you can never be to careful...

* or Myspace.. or Facebook..

Vulnerability in WordPad Text Converter Could Allow Remote Code Execution

Most people will rarely use WordPad these days, but it's installed on pretty much every Windows system out there. So when Microsoft announce a vulnerability in WordPad, it could spell trouble.. essentially, a specially-crafted WordPad file could run arbitrary code on your system.

WordPad documents have a .DOC or .WRI extension, and if you have Word installed (or a similar product) then .DOC files will default to loading in Word instead. So, to mitigate against this you could simply block .WRI files at your proxy and/or mail filter. Or you could use Windows XP SP3 or Vista.. but that's not exactly a quick fix. Or you could deassociate .WRI files from WordPad using a policy.

There aren't a lot of WRI files to test with on the web, so here's a harmless file I prepared earlier:

Spammers try and fail with fake Classmates email

We've seen this particular attack several times before - an email for a bank or other service that requires some sort of software installation to proceed.. in this case, masquerading as an update to Flash for some nonsense to do with Classmates.com.

Subject: Classmates Organisation.Reunion Website Builder
From: "Classmates Messagebox#329" invitation591@classmates.com

Dear Classmates customer.
Classmates Day 2009 soon!

Video Invitation from your Classmates "2009 Classmates Day Announcement!" prepared to view.
Reunite Your High School Classmates and Celebrate This Day!
Your Classmates Are Waiting to Hear From You!

Proceed to view Your invitation now>>

With best regards, Lowell Abernathy.
Copyright 1995-2008 Classmates Online, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Unfortunately, the stupidity of spammer is such the they have messed up the incredibly long URL, and if the users click on the link they'll get nowhere. The spammer is trying to send visitors to a subdomains of clasmatessup.com but they have forgotten the dot before com and instead are sending visitors to clasmatessupcom.

If you go to the effort of correcting the link, you get redirected to a site on a fast flux botnet which prompts you: Can't see the video? please download the Adobe_Player v10 Converter and this leads to a downloaded called AdobePlayer10.exe which actually doesn't appear to be malware (at the moment) as it identifies itself as "IIS Fortezza Setup Utility" which is a security add-on to Microsoft IIS servers, usually called fortutil.exe.

So, it's all kinda strange. Let's have a look at the WHOIS details for the domain:

Domain name: clasmatessup.com

Registrant Contact:
inc inc
Greff Frelos inc@yahoo.com
4576810811 fax: 4576810811
8883 Sh Road
New York NY 10003
us

[blah blah]

DNS:
ns1.licence-dsl.com
ns2.licence-dsl.com

Created: 2008-12-07
Expires: 2009-12-07

Of course, these are fake. The registrar is BIZCN.COM, who are often a registrar of choice for spammers. Of real interest are the name servers, ns1.licence-dsl.com is 207.150.183.180, ns2.licence-dsl.com is 66.34.177.43. 207.150.183.180 is an IP address connected with the Srizbi botnet and is a name server for a whole buncha domains.

If you run a corporate mail system, it might well be worth blocking email "from" classmates.com in any case, even if this time the spam is hugely unsuccessful, because all the bad guys will do is repackage it up and send it out again.

Joe Job against GoldPoll.com: welcome to the murky world of HYIP

GoldPoll.com is a web site about HYIPs (High Yield Investment Programs) that is hosted in the British Virgin Islands to an anonymous (possibly Panamanian) registrant, and until recently the registrar was the well-known fraudster's friend EstDomains. Despite this unpromising pedigree, it does appear that GoldPoll.com is legitimate..

..well, as legitimate as anything is in the world of HYIPs. Most HYIPs are generally just a front for Ponzi schemes and offer ridiculous payout rates such as 2% interest per day (about 624% per year) which are clearly unsustainable.

Anyway, as you can imagine there are a LOT of fraudulent HYIP schemes (are there any that are actually legitimate?) GoldPoll.com attempts to flag up schemes that aren't paying up.. which means that they have obviously annoyed some HYIP scammer somewhere who has decided to carry out a Joe Job against GoldPoll.com:

Subject: Gold Poll
From: goldpoll.com.ads@gmail.com
Date: Sat, December 6, 2008 3:57 pm

The most relevant information about the top HYIP programs from the best hyip monitoring. http://www.goldpoll.com


We personally invest in each HYIP and check the reliability of everyday payments. Click on any HYIP name to be redirected to it. Click on Program Details to get further information about a HYIP, find other members' posts and vote yourself.

goldpoll.com

Now GoldPoll.com states: "We never send SPAM and hate SPAMmers. Please don't trust in any e-mail that appeared to be from us and not stated on our Newsletters Archive!" which of course doesn't mean that much.. but a close investigation of the offending email indicates that it came from 211.95.78.71 in China. Now, 211.95.78.71 isn't just any IP address, it happens to be a server where a number of HYIP related domains are hosted:

• Accuramoney.com
• Bestinvestfar.com
• Bestnethosta.com
• Dalamonda.com
• Google-analyser.com
• Google-optimise.com
• Google-spider.com
• Healthcarem.com
• Heroesadvent.com
• Homegome.com
• Injektus.com
• Jampadventures.com
• Libertyreiserve.com
• Libertyrescerve.com
• Luckautomachine.com
• Luckjewel.com
• Maxcargotrade.com
• Ordtechnologies.com
• Platinumtvonline.com
• Sekermen.com
• Toguessgame.com
• Trancgroup.com
• Webtradersite.com

It seems that there is a related server to this at 64.63.1.204, at least one of the domains (nasdaq-invest.com) is on GoldPoll.com's blacklist (there may be others).

• Al-moeed.com
• Boodjewel.com
• Deluxeinvestment.org
• E-investbank.net
• Fastprofit-2008.com
• Futureinvest.biz
• Gpttalkpro.com
• Higaintrade.com
• Hyip-profits.com
• Hyip-world.com
• Hyipchecking.com
• Hyipozaurus.biz
• Katyadumper.com
• Libertyrieserve.com
• Mcdump.com
• Monemoke.com
• Moneyinvests.biz
• More-invest-2009.com
• Nasdaq-invest.com
• Pensioninsurancefund.com
• Perfectservers1.us
• Photos-vn.com
• Realforex.us
• Sectrustbonline.com
• Solid-fund.com
• Supervirtualcards.com
• Teekypleaze.com
• Tieudiemchinh.com
• Tomerbusiness.com
• Tophyipsite.com
• Ukoblos.com
• Userinvest.com
• Wertor.info
• Wmrub.com

If you are an HYIP investor, then take some of these domain names and Google for them, and you'll get the measure of [un]reliable they are. You can pretty much guarantee that they are closely related.

But really my best advice is to avoid HYIP altogether. It's basically just a form of gambling, but with much worse odds in the long run.

"Alpha Soft Company" bogus employment offer

Alpha Soft Company is a wholly legitimate Ukrainian software development company, this fake job offer is being sent out by someone pretending to be Alpha Soft, and who is fraudulently using the name of Taras Vergovsky (who is a director) in order to make the offer seem more credible.

There have been a few similar emails targeting companies from the Ukraine recently, for example: Infopulse, JavaRealm Software, VM-Soft, SocMart. They all follow a similar pattern and wording, and all mention the name of a senior person within the company.. and they are all bogus. In short, this is just another money laundering scam that should be avoided at all costs.

---

Hello Sir/Madam.

I Taras Vergovsky, Director of Alpha Soft Company specializes in innovative IT solutions and complex software projects development.

My company based in Ukraine. We've earned ourselves a reputation of a reliable and trustworthy partner working successfully with a number of West European companies and providing them with reliable software development services in financial and media sectors. Unfortunately we are currently facing some difficulties with receiving payments for our services. It usually takes us 10-30 days to receive a payment and clearing from your country and such delays are harmful to our business. We do not have so much time to accept every wire transfer.

That's why we are currently looking for partners in your country to help us accept and process these payments faster. If you are looking for a chance to make an additional profit you can become our representative in your country. As our representative you will receive 8% of every deal we conduct. Your job will be accepting funds in the form of wire transfers and forwarding them to us. It is not a full-time job, but rather a very convenient and fast way to receive additional income. We also consider opening an office in your country in the nearest future and you will then have certain privileges should you decide to apply for a full-time job. Please if you are interested in transacting business with us we will be very glad.

Please contact me for more information via email: alphasoft.ua.job@gmail.com

and send us the following information about yourself:

1. Your Full Name as it appears on your resume.
2. Education.
3. Your Contact Address.
4. Telephone/Fax number.
5. Your present Occupation and Position currently held.
6. Your Age

Please respond and we will provide you with additional details on how you can become our representative. Joining us and starting business today will cost you nothing and you will be able to earn a bit of extra money fast and easy. Should you have any questions, please feel free to contact us with all your questions.

Thank you,
Taras Vergovsky ,
Alpha Soft Company

---

Some email addresses to look out for are alphasoft.ua.job@gmail.com, sup.alphasoft@gmail.com, job.alphasoft@gmail.com.. there are probably others. Sending IP is 217.170.2.228.

Awesome or what? The Nokia N97.

Announced a couple of hours ago, the Nokia N97 is a pretty awesome looking bit of kit. We've waited a long, long time for Nokia to come up with something like this.. although I don't think that I will be giving up the Nokia E90 just yet, since the rumour is that there will be a touchscreen Communicator next year (probably announced at Mobile World Congress).

It's not cheap: €550 (around £450 or $650) SIM-free before tax. You can get a laptop for that. Very tempting though...