Are you online a lot? Do you participate in online discussion groups and forums? Do you have your own blog or website? If so, then you're a target for a particularly nasty type of email, one that is not only criminal, but attacks the name of our Lord and Savior as well.
What follows is an example of the sort of email I'm receiving at least three times a week, since I've built our church website. And some appropriate actions that you can take in the event that YOU receive something like this...
SUBJECT: Your Ministry is Chosen to Benefit
Church Building Foundation Inc.
70 Elthorne AvenueLondon W7 2JW
Tel: +44-7045-756274
Fax: +44-7006-034-950
Dear,
Calvary greeting in the name of our lord Jesus Christ, my name is Rev. Augustine Gowell, I am the founder of church building foundation inc based in London uk, we help churches raise fund, give to the less privileged, build the growth of the church youths, see to their other financial needs, we have a lot of philanthropists in our foundation and they are directors and owners of multinational company’s whom we have thought the importance of giving and by the grace of almighty God they understood it and are practicing it, this year through our yearly donations to churches, your church was picked as one of the beneficiaries of 2007 year donation to churches whom will also help this foundation to distribute funds to other churches and orphanages as will be directed to you by this foundation.
This is a secret seed sowing which must be giving secretly and received secretly which we believe that it’s the best form of giving (i.e. giving in the secret). Your church is to receive a total of $1m usd. In which will be paid to your account in bits, you are to get a total of $100,000usd, which is 10% of the total sum, this you are expected to use it wisely for the growth and development of the church of God, you have to at this point advice us on the account where this fund will be remitted to you which must be an equity line of credit account, as we are informed by the donors of this fund. If you don’t have it look for a trusted member in the church that has it whom will abide to your instruction when the money is paid into his/her account.
Note that the money is for a purpose in the church and not for your personal use and that is what you are to do with it as instructed earlier, it must have to serve the purpose why it was giving to you, after this year, you will be included in our list as one of the receivers of this fund but will not be distributed by you as you will be receiving from other organizations just as some of them are going to receive from you. You are to provide us with your phone and fax numbers, your present address, and a copy of your id. After receiving and distributing this seed, you are to always share the problem of your ministry with us so that if there is any member of this foundation who it will touch to help will be directed to you.
Remain blessed as you abide by the instruction to distribute this to the people of God for the benefit of mankind and glory of God and be strong in the works of the lord for he is the rewarder of our good works.
What To Do
Here's what you do, should you receive an email like this...
- DO NOT REPLY to the email or respond to the sender in any way whatsoever!
- REPORT the sender, by forwarding the message to the proper government agencies...
- The Federal Trade Commission's anti-spam address...
spam@uce.gov - If the message involves any possible financial fraud, report it to the U.S. Securities and Exchange commission, here...
enforcement@sec.gov - PayPal is one of the largest and well-known financial transaction processors on the web. If you have a PayPal account, you will most likely occasionally be targeted by email messages asking you to verify your account information. When you receive a message like this, report it to PayPal, here...
spoof@paypal.com - The same goes for any other large and well-known company. If you have any reason whatsoever to doubt the validity of an email sent to you, and it's regarding a company that you do business with, then report the email to that company. Here are some of the larger (and thus, more often targeted)...
eBay: spoof@ebay.com
Washington Mutual: spoof@wamu.com
Wells Fargo: Contact is vea their website's contact page
- The Federal Trade Commission's anti-spam address...
- Klaus Brune's blog
- Login or register to post comments
