For the last 24 hours I have been receiving numerous emails from an account claiming to be Mark Zuckerburg, the founder of Facebook. While I would love the chance to sit down with the Facebook CEO, there is only one problem, the account is registered to Marc Zucckerburg (notice the spelling). The account not only features the face of the company’s founder, but claims that he wants to give me a free Apple iPhone, oh happy day!
Realizing immediately that Mark Zuckerberg was spelled incorrectly I reached out to Facebook using their basic spam forms, foolishly thinking they would realize the name and delete the account immediately, then I received a second message and a third via Facebook Messaging from Zucckerburg (all in a 24 hour period) so I decided to click on his “Cause” page included in the email (just for fun since I have a well guarded Macbook Pro) at which point I was immediately taken to (don’t click this link): http://www.facebook.com/pages/Face-Book-Giveaway/172228279494824 and then redirected seconds late to (again don’t click this link): http://prizebook.w2c.ru/facebook/award/index.php (notice its, a scam site that asks me to sign up and pay for various programs to receive my “free prize.”
After 24 hours the account remained in place so I then decided to abuse the Facebook system and click on “Report” followed by “Credible Threat Of Violence” and again on “Report” and “Sexually Explicit” I know those are not the proper uses of the system, but Facebook was ignoring an obvious bit of spam that I had already reported through proper channels. [Read more…]