14 DAY TRIAL // As you might have noticed, if you have been reading my previous articles, I am a Yahoo! Messenger user. I've seen a lot of spam-scams going over the IM - some are based on people's naivety and others are based on virus infection. And here's one of the latest:
People in my list have been sending me some rather silly messages. They're something like "Hi, my name is X, and my son, Y has Leukemia. My wife and I can barely pay the bills, but we've made a deal with Yahoo! and AOL, and for every person that receives this message we get 5 cents. Send it to all the people in your list so that little Y may have a chance!" This is the basic type of message. But it comes in 3 shapes - the basic annoying spammy one, with no links or phone numbers or anything. Then, there's the second type of message that says "If you want to help more, click the link" of course, I never bothered to click, as I suppose it's malware infected. Then, there's the third type of message that includes a phone number - I sure know a scam message when I see it!
And here's how you can tell it's not for real: You might call me a cruel person, that doesn't want to help little Y, but actually, there's no kid to help. Besides the lack of details and the fact that I've been receiving this message for some time in a similar form, just take a look at things - this message has been sent a million times probably, now, if Yahoo! and AOL had really wanted to help this kid, then they would have just gave him the money, instead of making this deal that costs a lot more. These are just classic scams - you either get a virus or lose your money to a premium number. Do not fall for this - people that ask for your help like these guys do, will most probably not ask for it over an IM program!