14 DAY TRIAL // The name of Nelson Mandela has often been leveraged in scams. Trend Micro provides a couple of examples: one sample that was doing the rounds before Mandela died, and one that started landing in inboxes after his death.
The email that was doing the rounds in November was entitled “Celebrate with us Nelson Mandela alive!” and it informed recipients that they’d won millions of dollars in cash. The scam messages read something like this:
“Uthingo National Lottery South Africa in conjunction with the Nelson Mandela Foundation, Celebrating Nelson Mandela alive, Announce your EMAIL ID today as one of the lucky winning emails of this month November 2013. Winning the Uthingo National email Lottery.”
The lottery scams that started making the rounds after Mandela’s death are entitled “Nelson Mandela Humanitarian Awards.” They read:
“Today the government and people of South Africa morn the death of their first democratically elelcted president and Global Icon, Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela. In fulfillment of one of his last wishes to alleviate global poverty, 10 people every year on the day of his death, will receive the Nelson Mandela Humanitarian Awards (NMHA).”
In both cases, potential victims are asked to send their personal details to a specified email address.
Of course, no one ever wins anything. The emails have nothing to do with legitimate organizations. After users respond to these messages, they’re asked to provide more personal and financial information.
Furthermore, they’re asked to pay certain amounts of money that are allegedly needed to complete the transfer of the prize money.
Since money transfer services such as Western Union and Money Gram are utilized, it’s difficult for the victims to track down the scammers after they realize that they’ve been duped.
