Anti-Scam Website Spams for Donations? (or not)

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Anti-Scam Website Spams for Donations? (or not)

Today I got an urgent-sounding unsolicited email promoting a website claiming to fight internet fraud. They were asking for a donation.

I noticed the message because it was one of about seven junk messages that fooled SpamButcher's email filter into letting pass today.

Subject: Donate for website
MAKE DONATION TODAY! Donate for website which fights money laundry and...

The message contained a link pointing to a seemingly legitimate anti-scam website. The email goes on to list an e-gold (sort of like PayPal) account which someone could make a donation to.

My first response was:

Who does this douche-bag think he is? Does he not understand the irony of asking for donations for an anti-scam website using spam?

Then I noticed a few things:

The website was well-written in English.

In contrast, the email asking for money had poor grammar - suggesting it was written by someone who didn't speak English as their primary language (perhaps based in Nigeria?).

The website didn't request any donations, or mention an e-gold account.

So, my new take is that the website listed in the email exposed someone committing fraud. In revenge, the fraudster sent this email out with two goals:

Generate tons of hate-mail to the site that exposed him

Collect donations sent to their own e-gold account

This wouldn't be the first time scammers took action against anti-scam websites. Hopefully this won't work.

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