From: as863@FreeNet.Carleton.CA (Christopher Greenan)
Newsgroups: ont.jobs,bc.jobs,can.jobs,tor.general,can.legal
Subject: Repost: HOW TO RECOGNIZE A 'POSSIBLE SCAM'
Date: Thu Nov 21 10:43:02 1996

Christopher Greenan (as863@FreeNet.Carleton.CA) writes:
Yes, ladies and gentlemen, It's time again for 'HOW TO RECOGNIZE A POSIBLE
SCAM'.  Due  to  the increase of idiots trying to scam people out of their
money, I'd thought I'd repost it for your protection. :)

Chris

From weigand@ssnet.com Thu Nov 16 19:54:19 EST 1995


To all of the jobs-offered newsgroups,  I apologize for posting this, as I
realize it is not a job offer. However, I feel that the importance of this
material outweighs any netiquette issues.  If you  think otherwise, please
tell me so.


               HOW TO SPOT WORK-AT-HOME SCAMS (and others)
               ===========================================
                  Copyright (c) 1995, Steven E. Weigand



Author:  Steven Weigand,  (weigand@ssnet.com).
Date of this revision:  November 10,  1995

Copyright info:  This document is freely distributable as long as
there are no undocumented changes.  It is not okay to make any
money off of this document, in part or in whole,  except from the
cost it takes to reprint and distribute it.  It is okay to quote
sections of this document, provided it does not violate any of
the previous rules.  You may make  changes to the document only
if you have completely documented these changes in the revised
version.

Note:  This file is currently over 900 lines long.  As such,
your system may not be able to view all of it.  If so,  email me,
and I'll send it to you in smaller pieces.  If you have reached
the end of the document, for help you will see the text, "END OF
FILE."

===========================


I, and a lot of others, have recently noticed the upsurge of
scams being misrepresented as legitimate job offers in the jobs.*
newsgroups. I have created this document to educate people a
little more on how to identify scams in general,  including brief
explanations of specific scams.  If you are thinking about
answering an ad for a work-at-home offer on the net, then you
should read this report first.  You might discover that your
dreams of getting rich are being used by scammers to manipulate
you into giving them money.

I have NOT seen a legitimate and "workable" work-at-home offer
posted to any of the newsnet newsgroups AT ALL.  Period.  They
are all either scams, or they are so difficult to do that no
ordinary person can do them.  Most of the work-at-home offers
fall under the category of "scams",  and the small amount of
remaining offers are mostly just impossible to do or would
result in little to no income.  Scams typically deceive people
about what it is they would be doing,  take their money,  and
then give them something totally useless in return.  The
non-workable work-at-home offers try to deceive a person about
how difficult it is to make money doing the work.
They make their money off of selling you their information
packages, but they could care less if you can put their
information to use and actually make any money.

There just does not appear to be any legitimate and realistic
work-at-home businesses being offered on the net.  I could
explain any one you want.  And this is a serious offer:  if you
are in doubt of any work-at-home offer, email me the ad you saw,
and ask me for my analysis of it.  Any get-rich- quick scheme is
also a scam.  Don't fall for any of them.  Always question
yourself.  Ask yourself why such a great offer exists,  and
what's so special about yourself that *you* would be given such a
wonderful opportunity, (as opposed to the rest of the population
that's still struggling to make a buck).

I've been posting about scams for a while now,  telling everyone
to mail me for more information.  What I found to be somewhat
interesting is that, of the people who responded,  most were
women.  It could be that the men are too proud to ask for advice,
for it would reveal their weakness.  Women, on the other hand,
may not be as concerned about their egos or insecurities
and may find it easier to ask for help more often.  I just found
it odd that most of the people that are falling for these scams,
*seemingly*, are women; in particular,  women in college.  So a
message to all you concerned boyfriends and parents out there:
Warn your girlfriends and daughters about these scams.  Become
aware of them and teach others. Throughout this document,  I use
the terms "scams" and "scammers."  How I define a scam is as
follows:  A scam is anything that is used to get money from
others by promising them something they want,  deceiving them
about what it is they are getting,  and then giving them
something useless or unrealistically difficult to do (more
difficult than it was described to be).  A scammer is anyone who
is in charge of the scam.   How I define "work-at-home offers" is
as follows:  A work-at-home offer is anything being offered to
people whereby they would be able to make money at home doing it.
This falls into 2 categories:  Work-at-home JOB offers and
work-at-home INFORMATION PACKAGES.  The work-at-home job offers
involve people actually working for a real company,  making a
salary or a commission, while the work-at-home information
packages merely give people the information needed for them to
start their own home businesses.  A trend on the net is for
scammers to pretend to give work-at-home job offers,  but
what people actually get for their money is nothing more than an
information package which usually turns out to be useless.

The key word throughout this entire document is "deception".  The
scammers will try to deceive you about what it is they are
offering you for your  money.  The best defense for deception is
wisdom and being able to see things for what they are.  This
involves arming yourself with the knowledge contained in this
document and being a good researcher.  Always know exactly
what it is you are getting for your money.  You need to research
these  work-at-home offers thoroughly (or anything being sold on
the net for that matter).  Be relentless until you get all of
your questions answered from these people.  Never give anyone any
of your money until you have an exact picture of what it is you
are getting for your money. The following is a list of some
things to look for that give away scams on the net.  These are
just things to look for and do not necessarily indicate that
something is a scam or not.  It's up to your intuition to
determine if something is really a scam.  Hopefully this list
will provide you with some food for thought:


0. General rule of thumb:  Scammers will do EVERYTHING they can
possibly do to dress up their scam in order to make it look
legitimate.  If it looks like a legitimate offer,  it may just be
that the scammer is adept at fooling people.  Throughout this
list,  you will learn some of the techniques that scammers use to
trick you.  Pay attention! :-)


1. The return email address is not present,  and all you are
given is  a postal mail address with which to reply.  If they
have no return email address,  it's like forging their names or
sending anonymous postings. They can't be tracked down and held
responsible for fraud if they have no return address.  That way,
they protect themselves.


2. They are posting from an anonymous account.  You may see on
the bottom of the article: "This was posted using the anonymous
service." Typically,  the return email address will be something
like, "an10202@anon.penet.fi",  for example.  Read #1.  This is
almost a  dead give-away that it's a scam.  They might explain
their use of an anonymous mail server as, "Oh,  I use an
anonymous mail service because my regular account doesn't allow
me to use email."  Well,  that's impossible, since,  in order to
have an anonymous email account, you FIRST need to have a normal
email account!

They might also say that their normal account doesn't allow them
to post to newsgroups,  so they have to go through an anonymous
service.  That's fine,  and sometimes that is the case.  But
then,  why don't they list their "real" name and email account?
They usually just say that you  should reply to the anonymous
account and do not give you their real account addresses.


3. They give a P.O. box for a physical address.  While it is
fairly normal for legitimate businesses to give you a P.O. box,
it still raises suspicion.  Since there is no REAL physical
address given,  you really have no idea where this guy lives in
reality.  He can't be tracked down. Anyone can get a P.O. box.
It doesn't mean that the company really exists.


4. They don't give a voice phone #.  Often times,  you will see a
scam list a phone number of some sort.  Most people don't even
try it out to see if it's real or not.  They just figure,  "Oh,
he lists a phone number I can call!  Good to know,  but I'll just
send him email."  OR,  if you call the phone #,  what you might
find is a fax machine on the other side!  This means that someone
has setup a stupid little fax machine to take complaints/orders.
So that means that you can't call the guy up and talk to him
voice-to-voice and confront him about his scam.  This
way,  he can ignore you if he wants.  It's a scam!

Another good possibility is that the phone number is a fake.  If
you call it,  you may get someone on the other end who has no
idea about what you are saying.  In that case, the scammer just
put any random phone number down on the ad so that he would look
more legitimate.


5. They will often tell you,  "Send a SASE - self addressed
stamped  envelope - for FREE information!"  This is certainly
more attractive than telling you to send them money for a report
on how to make money. You don't want to be sending any money,
right?  And they know it.

   But two things happen here:

      a. You will be sent back a short 3 page response saying
something like, "This is a great deal!  Lots of people are doing
it,  and you could make a TON of money!  All you have to do is
send us $25 to get you started,  and we'll send you back all the
software needed!  Just $25!"   Now,  for most people,  $25 is a
pretty small investment,  so they don't think twice about it.  If
it were $50, then that's another story.  Most of these scammers,
through trial-and-error,  have determined that the threshold
amount to ask for is about $25.  So if you get a "contract" or
something back asking for $25,  you can automatically know that
it's probably a scam. $25 isn't enough to make *most* people
start to call the guy up on the phone or ask him about his offer,
and the scammers know it.


      b. But let's take this further... They asked you for a SASE
for their free information.  Well,  the most you can stuff in an
envelope  with only one U.S. stamp on it is about 3 pages.  You
need more stamps on your envelope if you want to send large
amounts of stuff. So the total amount of information they're
sending you is pretty small.  Why,  then,  couldn't they simply
just email you their documents?  It's pretty simple to type up
the documentation of only 3 pages,  isn't it?  They could just
store it into a file and send people the file whenever they get a
request over email. But they don't.  They want you to mail them
through the postal mail  for one of 3 reasons:


1) They don't expect their email accounts to be around for very
long,  because they realize that others are going to tell their
system administrators about them,  and they will be deleted soon.


2) They realize that it's psychologically more appealing to people
to send their SASE's away to a physical address, rather than just
an email address,  since it feels more legitimate.


3) Although this is more rare,  people like to collect
the names and addresses of "suckers" and sell lists of these
people to other advertisers/scammers;  think about it: if you had
a scam or some worthless product to sell,  wouldn't you love to
get your hands on a list of people that are identified as naive
and easy to scam?  Lists like these can be sold for as much as 10
cents per name!  If you receive 1000 names,  that's $100!


6. What's becoming more frequent these days is that the scammers
will forge their names as FEMALES instead of males.  99% of the
time,  the scammers are all males on the net (that's from
personal observation, not from anything I can substantiate).  But
we're now starting to see *supposed* females offering these
work-at-home scams.  What you'll see is that the return email
address will read something like, "work4u@aol.com (Mary Smith)".
Well,  if you know anything about computers,  you can make up any
name you want.  I could change my name to "Elmer Fudd" if I
wanted to.  In this case,  the person  changed HIS name to "Mary
Smith".  And if HE lists a physical postal address or a phone
number,  he will say to address it to Mary Smith.
   Why?  Why would they want to make you believe that a female
was in charge of this "job offer"?  Well,  if you're like me,
you believe that females are more trustworthy and truthful than
males.  It's instinctive and inherent in our programming to trust
women -- it goes back to the whole mother-child relationship.
These scammers know that  if they give a male name,  you are
going to be more suspicious of them than if they give a female
name!  Don't let them play on your emotions / instincts.  Treat
every "job offer" as a male,  even though it may list a female
name.  It may just turn out to be a female on  he other side,
but you shouldn't just trust it is so.


7. They give company names,  like "Scholar Technologies",  for
example. Now,  99% of the people aren't going to verify the
existence of the company,  but you should be one of those 1% that
does.  You can make a quick call to Long Distance Information,
and ask the operator if he/she has a phone # for that particular
company.  If the operator can't provide any phone #,  then the
company does NOT exist.  Another thing you can do is give a call
to the BBB (Better Business Bureau) in the company's area to see
if they have any complaints on the company. If they have no file
for the company (ie,  they don't even know that the company
exists),  then it may be bad, but you don't know.


8. Beware of netnews postings that offer these work-at-home scams
which have one posting RIGHT after it from another person saying,
"Oh,  this is a great offer!  I did this a while ago,  and I'm
making good money!" It's usually from the same scammer or a
collaborator of his,  even though it's from a different email
address.  It gives you the idea that it must be legitimate,
because someone else says it is;  but you really don't know who
that someone else is,  do you?  There may be dozens of "other
people" following up to the original ad,  all saying that it is
a wonderful job,  but they could all be forged articles!
Inspect the articles further.  Compare the styles of writing with
the original ad, and if they match,  you have to suspect a scam.
Note:  I have encountered this before,  where there were almost a
dozen follow-ups from the same scammer,  each pretending to be
someone else who just loved the job.  In that particular case,  I
noticed that everyone who replied to the article was from AOL
(aol.com).  Furthermore,  I noticed that all of  the replies were
written in the same style,  often making the same spelling
mistakes and capitalizing words inadvertently.


9. Beware of postings on newsnet whereby you see the SAME
work-at-home scam posted over and over daily.  What you might see
on your news  reader is:


misc.jobs.misc

        Mary Smith        Work at Home!
        Mary Smith        !!! Work at Home !
        Mary Smith        Can You Start by 9/29?
        Mary Smith        This is a GREAT Opportunity!


   Notice that the same person has posted the same "offer" over
and over again in the same news group,  one right after the
other.  The only thing they changed was the title of the article,
because they know that if they use the same title,  then
"threaded" news readers will just display:


        Mary Smith    4   Work at Home


   (In other words,  a threaded news reader will just explain
that there are 4 letters from the same person,  and it won't make
much psychological impact on suckers.)   This is the sign of a
truly desperate scammer who knows nothing about netiquette.
Anytime you see something like this, just realize it's a scam.


10. Beware of postings on newsnet whereby you see the same
work-at-home scam posted to DOZENS of newsgroups.  This,
combined with #9,  is called "spamming".  Spamming just means,
"scamming people with amazing zeal across many newsgroups."
Spammers are the worst kind of scammers. They can't take a hint.
They will post multiple times daily to multiple newsgroups,  even
when they've been exposed as a scam by someone on the net.  Just
ignore them.  I don't care how legitimate the "offer" sounds;  if
it's being "spammed",  then it is a scam! What's worse is that
they're learning now how NOT to cross-post. When you cross-post
on netnews,  you will see a bunch of newsgroups at the top of
your news,  representing all the newsgroups that the same article
was posted to.  If you are annoyed by the article,  you can
simply press just one key to junk the article in EVERY newsgroup,
not just the one you're in currently.  So they've learned NOT to
cross-post. Instead,  they'll post the article in each group
discretely.  That means that you,  the annoyed reader of these
newsgroups,  has to see that scam OVER and OVER again in many
newsgroups without being able to just press a key to make it go
away.


11. If you see something in the offer like, "This is NOT a
scam!",  then it's most likely  a scam.  It's like saying, "Trust
me!"  :-) Just because the guy says it's not a scam,  it doesn't
mean that you should believe him!  It's the last resort of a
truly desperate man.  You'd be surprised at how many gullible,
naive people there are who will erase all feelings of suspicion
when they see, "This is not a scam! ... This is a LEGITIMATE
offer!"


12. Beware of AOL (aol.com), CompuServe (CompuServe.com),
Prodigy,  and Netcom (netcom.com) users.  I have found that the
majority of scams are coming from people on these services.  Keep
an eye out for them. Generally,  ANY public internet service
provider is capable of harboring many scammers.  Be warned!



On the other side of the coin,  I have found that one *can* trust
people from education (.edu) and government (.gov) sites much
*more* than any commercial (.com, .org, or .net) site for the
following reasons:

    1) Non-anonymity -- They don't just let ANYONE come onto
their computers and use them if they have enough money,  no
questions asked.  Instead, they HAVE to be students or on the
faculty for  ".edu" sites.  And for ".gov" sites,  they HAVE to
be employees of the organization. This way,  the system
administrators at these sites ALWAYS know who their users are,
where they are physically,  and their phone #'s. This is not true
for a lot of public internet service providers (like Netcom,  for
example),  where all it takes is for you to fill out an on-line
form and send in some money.  On many public internet services,
people can sign-on under aliases without the system
administrators knowing,  or even caring,  about it.


    2) Accountability -- Folks from ".edu" and ".gov" sites have
the most to lose when they try to pull scams from their sites.
In the case of ".edu" sites,  a student could be thrown out of
school, or a faculty member could be fired.  There was a case 4
years ago at the University of Delaware,  my alma mater,  whereby
a student was thrown out of school after pulling a scam on
someone through the internet.  He also had to pay back the money
he scammed off of others.   If a professor tried to pull a scam,
could you imagine how tough it would be for him/her to find
another job after being fired, especially in such a tight job
market?  In the case of ".gov" sites,  people can be fired
and their security clearances could be revoked indefinitely.
Whereas, in the case of commercial internet services,  often
times, the only thing that they can do is kick someone off their
computers, but the scammers can usually get right back on the
internet with another service.  And good luck trying to get your
money back from people on commercial internet services.  At least
in ".edu" and ".gov" sites, your chances of getting your money
back are fairly high. Therefore,  for these reasons,  I feel that
people from ".edu" and ".gov" sites are a *little* more
trustworthy than the other sites.  My hypothesis is verified by
continuous scanning of the internet for scams; I only found the
"Make Money Fast" scam being posted by ".edu" people, but then,
most of them didn't know it was a scam to begin with,  and
this scam is much more benign than all the other ones.  Mind you,

    "trust no one" is a good credo.


13. Some people are "kind-hearted" scammers.  These are scammers
that don't know they are scammers.  They might think they're
doing something totally legitimate,  but in fact,  are pulling a
scam.  For example, in the case of that old "Make Money Fast"
pyramid scheme that you've probably seen a dozen times before,
some people don't know it's a scam and post it to a bunch of
groups.  These could even be people on ".edu" and ".gov" sites,
so watch out!  These people are just naive and don't know that
what they're doing is a scam,  so they'll be the ones that
often seem most trustworthy and sincere.  If what they're doing
sounds like a scam,  ask them why they don't think it is a scam.
If they tell you something like, "It's not a scam,  because the
person I got it from said it wasn't a scam,"  then you have
reason to be worried.  Be warned!


14. Any "job offer" which costs money up front is a scam.
Anytime you hear the excuse, "We charge you $25,  because that's
to weed out those people who aren't serious about this,"  then
you are being scammed.  NO  legitimate business offer will ask
for $25 up front.  If you're the one who's offering legitimate
work-at-home work,  you're not going to simply ask for $25 from
your employees;  you're going to call the people up and ask them
for their references and resumes!  If you're told to send money
for this reason,  then just tell the scammer that you're
suspicious that he's trying to scam you,  that you would gladly
pay him $25,  or even DOUBLE that, but only AFTER you've made the
riches that he promises,  and see what he says.  If he's a
scammer,  you won't hear from him after that, or else he'll send
you a letter back with lots of cuss words in it.  If he's
legitimate,  he won't mind waiving the startup charge to you,
because he's confident that he'll be getting double the money
back.

This goes back to the difference between "job offers" and
"information packages."  So many times I have seen scammers
trying to pass information packages off as job offers.  They just
say that the $25 is to pay for start-up fees or to make sure that
you are serious about it.  Be warned about anyone that tries to
do this to you if you think you're being  offered a job.  It's
definitely not a job being offered.  You wouldn't be working for
anyone;  instead,  you'll get a useless information package for
your money.

    True,  you do need to invest money in any business that you
want to  start.  But we're not talking about "starting your own
home business." A lot of these scams aren't about that.  Instead,
they use phrases like, "Sign up with us,  working at home,  and
you'll make tons of money." They're not trying to sell you a
step-by-step guide to starting your own business at home.  They
know that people are generally too lazy to start their own home
businesses,  so instead,  they try to make it sound like they're
actually offering you a job whereby you can work at your home.
But if they ask for money,  it's usually a good tip-off that
they're scamming you.  If they were really offering you a job at
home, then they'd be asking you for references,  a resume,  a
phone interview, etc.



15. There will be a sense of urgency in the job offer.  The title
of the message might be, "Can you start by 9/29??"  It makes you
think, "Oh,  this can't be a scam,  because a scam doesn't have
time limits on it!  So it must be legitimate."  Wrong!  It's just
a device that the scammers use to prevent you from thinking hard
about the scam.  If you have no time to check the company out,
then they've got you! Check back in another week,  and you'll see
the same scam posted, but this time it will read, "Can you start
by 10/7?".  Someone pointed out to me that the secret of making
money is timing. "Timing is everything."  From my experience,
this tactic is used more often falsely than legitimately.  Timing
is hardly "everything" in a  stable work-at-home business.  Maybe
in the stock-market,  but not here.  If timing is indeed
involved,  then it falls into the "Get Rich Quick" concept,  and
we all know that these things are usually scams.


16. There will be a sense of popularity in the "job offer".  As I
already stated in item #8 (above),  if you think that others are
doing the work, too,  then you'll be inclined to believe that it
is not a scam. So you might see the following written in the job
offer: "If you don't hear from us immediately,  don't worry!
We've been having so much trouble keeping up with the demand
lately.  But we will get to you!" It misleads you into thinking
that tons of other people are doing this, so it must be
legitimate.  WRONG!  Just assume that nobody but yourself has
responded so far.


17. There will be a sense that they want you,  because YOU are
special to them.  For example,  the scam might say: "We know
you're smart,  because you're one of the elite few who has
figured out how to get onto the  internet to read this message.
That's why we're able to offer YOU this  great deal!"  They want
you to be thinking to yourself that you are special,  and that
the reason why everyone else in the world isn't doing this
wonderful job and making tons of money is because they  aren't as
smart as you.  Hogwash!  It's just another trick they're
trying to pull on you to bypass your logical reasoning brain and
get right to your emotional/irrational brain.  Stay firmly
grounded in reality.  You are NOT special to any of these people.
You are just a dollar sign to them.


18. There's just a general vagueness about exactly *what* it is
you'd be doing.  Here's a typical example of something you might
see:

   "Have you ever dreamed about making $1000,  $2000,  or even
        $3000 PER WEEK?!  Well,  stop dreaming about it and DO
something about it!  If you're in a dead-end job or you're
unemployed, now is the perfect time to say YES to your future.
Don't pass up this wonderful opportunity to better yourself.
Send SASE for more information..."  You can see that this ad says
absolutely nothing to you about what it is you'd be doing.  It's
so vague that nobody can flame it for any reason.  So you will
NOT see people responding to the article with a  thousand letters
like, "This is scam!  Don't fall for it!"  These scammers are
clever that way.  This is exactly why you can assume it's
nothing more than a scam.  If the people who posted the ad
thought  it was something people might like to hear,  then they
wouldn't try to disguise it;  they'd just come right out and tell
you what it was they were selling.  Instead,  they are afraid
that someone's going to be able to identify it as a scam.  This
way,  they can send their scam offer directly to the suckers out
there,  and the suckers won't see anything negative about it.


19. Beware of "Money Back Guarantees."  This is another thing
scammers use to mislead you into thinking that what they're doing
is legitimate.  If you get taken for $25,  do you really think
you'll get your money back even if the guy gave you a money back
guarantee?  And what are you going to do when he doesn't give you
the money back?  Are you going to spend $100 just to file a law
suit for $25,  not to mention off-time  from your day job and
lawyer fees?  The scammers all know that you're not going to file
a suit against them for a measly $25.  Therefore, just pretend
that you did not see the money back guarantee statement  written
on the ad.


20. "Information Packages."  Here,  the idea is that if you come
up with a good money-making idea,  you will share your idea with
others for a price.  Again,  the price is usually $25.  The
package is usually  advertised as being a "complete system."  It
sometimes misleads people into believing that if they purchase
the package,  they will be able to  start a business immediately,
painlessly,  and without any other help, when in fact,  they are
the ones who will have to do most of the work in setting up their
own businesses.  And sometimes it might mislead people into
thinking that the package is just a startup kit used to
facilitate their "employment" in some other company,  when in
fact,  they're just being sold information.  They make false
claims that hundreds of people have used their packages to make
money,  when in fact,  nobody has. When you get the package, you
will find that you cannot utilize the information at all.  In the
end,  you will have wasted your $25 for a package of perhaps 20
pages long which is absolutely useless.


21. "No experience necessary.  No resumes needed.  No interviews
neeeded. No references needed.  No education requirements
necessary. Etc."  These are things you should beware of if
someone is offering you a work-at-home job.  I don't know of too
many normal jobs that are given to just anyone without an
interview,  without a resume,  without education,  without
references, etc.  A big warning light should be going off in your
mind whenever you encounter one of these "job offers".  These job
offers will often be accompanied by "start-up/membership fees."
Now,  if you were a legitimate company offering a job,  which
would you rather do:

  1) Ask your applicants for money to prove he/she is the right
person for the job?  or


  2) Ask your applicants for their references,  an interview,
etc.?  After all,  these job offers will almost always suggest
that one could be making tons of money,  and if that is so,  I
doubt an employer would want to give that money to some
uneducated slob that he/she  doesn't even know.  If it were true
that any uneducated slob could do the job,  then why doesn't the
employer merely hire a bunch of people at, say, $6.00 an hour to
do the job,  and then the employer could pocket the "tons of
money" for him/herself??  It just doesn't make sense.  What
will normally happen is that you will pay your start-up fee,
they will take it,  and then give you an impossible task which
will yield no income for you whatsoever.



Infinity...

In the future,  I'll be adding to this list,  but for now,  that
should suffice.  You can start to see the patterns for yourself
on your own. SOME SPECIFIC SCAMS REVEALED:
=============================

Here is a very short list of scams that I've seen repeatedly
popping up on the net,  and I thought I'd expose them:


A. "Make Money Fast":  In this scam,  you will see a message from
someone, probably some guy named Dave Rhodes,  who describes how
he has never failed to make $50,000 per month doing this.  Then
he lists instructions for you to follow... You will see a list of
10 names and addresses listed on the bottom of the message.  Your
job is to first mail the first 5 people on the list, (#1, #2, #3,
#4, and #5),  a one-dollar-bill each. Then,  you are supposed to
bump up the list one slot.  So #1 gets tossed out,  #2 becomes
#1,  #3 becomes #2, and so on.  Then you insert your own name and
address as the new #10.  Once you do that, you send the revised
document to as many other people as you can.  The instructions
tell you to post it in as many newsgroups as you can and title it
"Make Money Fast".  Supposedly soon afterwards,  you should be
seeing thousands and thousands of dollars from people!  YEAH,
RIGHT!!  First of all,  this scam is illegal,  even though it
will specifically say it is not.  I'm not quite sure about the
specifics of it,  but I think it's refered to as a "Ponzi Scheme"
(a pyramid scheme where Ponzi was the name of the guy who first
got caught doing this,  I believe). It's under a chain mail /
mail fraud statute somewhere,  and if you get caught,  then
you're going to jail.  [Maybe someone can fill me in on the exact
specifics here.]  It doesn't matter if you do it through the
postal service or through email;  it's still mail fraud.

   Besides the fact that it's illegal,  do you honestly think it
would  work?  Shaa!  If you're like me,  what's stopping you from
just keeping your $5,  not sending out ANY money, and just
putting your name down as #5 on the list before sending it
(instead of #10)??  Seriously,  you'd have to be a complete moron
to send any money to anyone on the list. There are many
variations of this scam.  Sometimes people call it
a "mailing list" collection service,  whereby you're just paying
the first 5 names on the list $1 for their names,  and others
will pay you $1 a piece for your name.  They go on to say that
this is *why* it is legal.  But make no mistake, it is illegal.


B. "Work-At-Home with Your PC" (data entry / report
generation)...  These scams will tell you to send for FREE
instructions on how you can be  making TONS of money with just
your home PC,  printing reports, doing data entry,  managing
mailing lists, etc.  You name it.  It doesn't matter what service
you'd be doing.  It's just the fact that you're "using your PC at
home"... In these scams,  you send away for the FREE information,
usually giving them a SASE,  and they send you back a little,  2
to 3 page letter giving you some snow-job about the wonderful
amounts of money you could be making,  but you just have to
send them $25 to get started!  What you are promised for your $25
is usually a computer disk with all the software you need to get
started in business, making money immediately.  Well,  you think
it's a wonderful thing, and the $25 startup fee is really small,
so you do it!  After a few weeks,  you get your disk back with
little or no further instructions. So you look at what's on the
disk,  and low and behold,  what you find there are a few text
files.  You read the text files,  and as it turns out,  the text
files are just the same ad you responded to and the same
"report" that you got back asking for your $25!  In other words,
you've been had!  If it was advertised as "report generation",
then you would  be generating reports each time some other sucker
sent you their SASE's for your "report" on how they can be making
tons of money.  In other words,  you have to become another
scammer to make your money! Most people just realize that they've
been scammed and stop right there, but if you're contemplating
becoming a scammer,  stop.  You could go to jail.  Chances are,
the person which sold you the scam in the first place has been
doing this far longer than you have.  He knows how to  avoid
getting caught.  Do you?  If you thought it was hard getting a
job before,  try it after you have a fellony on your permanent
record! Not to mention that you might be going to jail for
several years.


C. "HUD Refund Tracer" scam.  Well, this isn't really a scam,
perse.  It goes like this:  The U.S. government has setup a
program whereby you can make a commission on "refunds" owed to
home-owners that took a loan out from the goverment a while back
and paid it off.  The deal was that if the home-owner paid the
loan back on time,  he/she could get a 10%(?) refund back from
the government.  The problem is that there's a lot of people
who forgot to collect their refunds,  so it's up to you,  as a
HUD refund tracer,  to track these people down,  tell them that
they have $1000 to $3000 coming to them,  and that you want
10-30% of that money for your services.
   The scammers put together a "package" telling you how to run
this  service.  They say, "You can start this business without
our help, but it's unlikely that you'll know how!  For just $25,
we will send you all of the info needed to be making money in
this business right away!" What you'll probably get is a bunch of
instructions,  basically telling you what you would've been able
to deduce after a short time talking with the government about
it.  The package might save you some time figuring out how to run
the business,  but that's where the benefits stop.  After
receiving your initial information package,  you'll read
somewhere that you need to pay them something like $50 for a list
of names and addresses of people who are owed money in your
state.  So you pay it.  Next,  there is the problem of finding
out their present phone numbers.  You could spend money calling
Information for those phone numbers,  or for just $40 more,  you
can get their CD-ROM filled with names, addresses, and phone
numbers of everyone living in your state.  Now you've invested
over $100 in their stuff.  But that's a drop in the bucket
according to them, compared to what you'll be making... Right?
   You have to ask yourself,  if you were one of those home
owners being owed $3000 back from the government,  what would
your reaction be to someone you don't even know telling you on
the phone that he wants 30% of your money?  If you're like me,
you'd hang up on the guy and go to the government to collect your
money directly.  You MIGHT be able to ask for 1% to 3% of their
money,  but certainly NOT 30%.  1% of $3000 equates to $30.  For
ALL of your work,  you get a measly $30 check.  Oh boy!
   That's certainly not the $500 check that is advertised by the
people  selling this information package.  And the amount of work
involved in tracking these people down,  doing the paper work,
and the long  distance telephone bills are not worth it for just
$30. Besides that, why aren't the scammers all doing it if they
could be making untold riches?  Why are they fiddling around with
this little "send us $25 for info" scheme?  The answer is that
they aren't making any money of the HUD Refund tracer program.
Instead, they make their money by selling you their reports and
software.  So you think,  "Well, what's wrong with that?"
Answer:  Imagine if you really had a business idea that could
make you $1000 per week for as little as 10-15 hours of work
(like they claim)?  If you paid full-time employees $6.00 per
hour to  call these people up for you,  then for paying them
$60-$90 or so,  you will be making $1000.  That's a 1000% to
1600% return for your investment. Now,  I don't know too much
about business,  but for that kind of return, wouldn't you have
to be a complete idiot not to get into it?  I have never heard of
any business making that kind of a return.  So why aren't these
guys doing this program that they are offering?  The answer,
of course, is that the program does NOT generate anywhere near
those kind of returns.  I'd be surprised if anyone was able to
make a living out of doing this, or even be able to make any
profit whatsoever off of it.


   Generalizing:
   -------------

There are a lot of scams which offer you "information packages"
for the low-low price of just $25 (or whatever they're asking).
You're just paying for information,  that's all.  It's up to you
to utilize that information,  and often,  you will find that it's
not worth it. Your $25 will be wasted.  And again,  you have to
ask yourself why the authors of those information packages aren't
doing what they're writing about.  If what they've written is
true, (that you can make so much money in your spare time),  then
why aren't they doing it?


D. "Earn $1800 weekly" (mailing circulars,  stuffing envelopes,
etc.) In this scam,  you are promised to be making as much as you
want for doing something suitably simple (so simple a child could
do it).  For example,  going on right now is a scam offering
"$1800/wk mailing circulars" (Sergei S*kolov,  I think,  is the
name of the guy running the scam).  Well,  you really have to ask
yourself why ANYONE would pay YOU $1800/week doing something so
simple as mailing circulars. That's nearly $100,000 per year,
about as much money as doctors and lawyers make.  So why would
just any poor, old, uneducated slob be able to make that kind of
money doing something so easy a child could do it? Exactly.
Something smells fishy here.  Same thing goes for  "stuffing
envelopes":  Often you'll hear something like, "Make $5.00 per
envelope stuffing envelopes!"  Or you'll hear, "Make money
PROCESSING MAIL at home."  Come on!  $5.00 PER ENVELOPE THAT YOU
STUFF?  You think to yourself,  "Oh m' gawd!  I can stuff 50
envelopes per hour,  so I could be making $250 per hour!
Amazing!"  Yeah,  right!  This is all the SAME scam,  and it's
linked to my second scam I explained (the report generation
scam).

   Now,  if you were a company,  and you had circulars or bulk
mailings to send out,  why on earth would you pay someone you
don't even know as much as $5.00 an envelope to simply stuff it
and send it out?  I've seen it as low as $1.00 per envelope and
as much as $15.00 per envelope! If you're a smart company,  you
will do your own in-house bulk mailings, paying your
secretaries/office-workers $5-$6 per HOUR to stuff envelopes.
that would save you about $240 per hour per employee!  But if the
scammer makes up some story about how he just has so much mail to
stuff,  and that he doesn't have enough personnel to stuff the
envelopes,  ask him why he doesn't just bring his business to a
direct mailing service.  Direct mailing services SPECIALIZE in
bulk mailings.  They can generate over 5000 stuffed envelopes per
hour!!  They have machines that can do it real fast without the
need for humans.  And you can even rent a machine like their's
for as little as $400 per day,  or buy one for $15,000!
That's a lot better than paying presumeably hundreds,  maybe
thousands, of people you don't even know a salary of $100,000 per
year (a total of $100Million in advertising costs to you!).  Now,
think about it! If a company can afford to spend $100,000,000 to
all of the people that are just stuffing envelopes or mailing
circulars PER YEAR,  then that company must be gigantic!  But if
it is a large company,  then it could afford the bulk-mailing
equipment,  and it could afford hiring more personnel on a
full-time basis to cover it,  which would mean that it would have
no need for home-workers stuffing their envelopes.  Bzzzzt.
   Does not compute!  It must be a scam.

   Here's how it works:  You are told to send a SASE to the guy
for FREE details.  You get a little contract back,  telling you
to send them $25 to get you started or because they want to "weed
out" those people that aren't serious.  So you send in the $25.
You get back a few  "circulars" or "reports" which are just the
same documents you saw when  you replied to the scammer's offer
through the mail.  The idea is that, yes,  you will be "stuffing
envelopes",  "processing mail"  or "mailing our circulars",  but
those envelopes that you stuff are the SASE's that people send
you asking for information on how to make money after YOU
advertise that they can be making tons of money stuffing
envelopes!! And "mailing our circulars" refers to the same thing:
you will be stuffing envelopes with that same scam you got back
from the scammer.  Same thing with "processing mail" at home.
It's all just the same scam.  It's basically the same as the
"report generation" scam I revealed above.  If you read something
like, "Make $5.00 per envelope THAT YOU SECURE,"  then you know
what it means now.

Read item "B" (above) for information on the consequences of
becoming a scammer.


E. "Assemble products at home" scam.  This is becoming more
popular.  You are told that you can have a modest income by
assembling toys or other  consumer goods at home.  This seems
like such a "real" job that it  couldn't be a scam.  Guess again.
Here's how the scam works:  You send away for the FREE
information,  and you get a little contract back stating that you
must send them $40 or so to get started.  In turn, they are
supposed to send you your first toy to assemble.  So you send
your $40 to them,  and you soon get a small kit in the mail.  The
kit does indeed contain parts of a toy that you can assemble.
After you assemble it, you're left wondering what to do next.
You think that you're supposed to send it back to the original
company and collect a paycheck or something, but in reality,
what you're supposed to do is sell the toy YOURSELF!  YOU must
locate a buyer for the toy.  And the toy probably doesn't look to
be worth more than a few dollars!  So you've been had.  To recap,
you purchased a $3 toy for $40,  and to rub salt in the wound,
YOU had to assemble it yourself.   Another thing that they try to
pull on you is that they will screw up  the parts in some way,
either by leaving parts out or by giving you parts that don't fit
together.  When you are unable to assemble the  product,  you are
told that it's your fault,   you will not get any refund, and you
won't be able to submit the toy back to them for your commission.

And I've heard of big-time scammers that used to do the following
with this:  They ask for $40 for your start-up kit.   For that
$40,  you get  your toy to assemble.  Then they tell you to send
the toy back,  and they will send you a check for something like
$50.  So you've made $10.  Next, you are told you can now
purchase two toys to assemble for just $50,  now that they know
you're serious.  So you send them $50,  they send you two toys,
you send the assembled toys back,  and you collect $70.  So
now you're up $30.  Then they make the big pitch to you, "Just
think.  If you purchase 100 toys from us for just $2000, you can
make $1000!" So you send out your check for $2000,  and what do
you get back?  You might get some toys back,  but either they'll
screw it up and blame it on you,  or they might just take off
with your money.  If you try to track them down and make them pay
you back,  you might find that they have disappeared without a
trace.  Beware.  Know who you're dealing business with and where
they are.


F. "MLM's - Multi-Level Management companies" (AMWAY, for
example).  These are usually not thought of as scams.  AMWAY, for
example,  is a very old and legitimate MLM.  Here's how an MLM
works:  Soeone approaches you with an amazing way to make money
part-time.  It's usually your boss, a co-worker, a family member,
or a friend that approaches you with it,  so you're instantly
lulled into a state of trust and acceptance. This person will
explain to you that this is "multi-level" management, which means
that there can usually be an infinite number of levels of
management.  So you might have someone managing you in the
program, but you also might be managing one or more people,  and
those people  under you (your "down-lines") can each manage their
own people,  etc.  Each person in the "pyramid" is expected to
sell products that the MLM offers.  The products could be things
like fruit baskets,  VCR's, cuttlery,  shoes, etc.,  but it can
also be long distance telephone service or insurance,  for
example.  When one of your down-lines makes a sale,  your
down-line will make something like a 10% commission on the sale,
but YOU will make something like a 2% commission on the sale
as well,  even though you did nothing.  This way, the profits
trickle upwards in the pyramid.  It may trickle as much as 5
levels upwards. You can imagine that if you have dozens of people
under you,  and they each have dozens of people under them,  each
making sales,  then you're going to be a very wealthy person
eventually, without getting up from your chair!  This is usually
why people join MLM's:  the dream of untold riches by just
sitting back and doing nothing.  Now for the real story:  Let's
say you do join an MLM.  You're making no money at first, you
have to pay the MLM yearly "dues",  and on top of  this,  you
have a monthly quota to make in terms of sales that YOU have to
make.  I've seen the monthly quota as low as $25.00 and as high
as $500 in certain MLM's.  When you sign the contract,  you are
told that if you do not make that quota,  you're out of the
program,  all of your down-lines become your manager's
down-lines, and your yearly membership fee will not be refunded.
What usually happens is that you're hyped up so much initially
that you're able to make the first month's quotas by selling
products to your friends,  family,  and co-workers. You have to
harass these people in your life to be able to sell your stuff,
and if you keep using them,  you'll eventually alienate yourself
from them.  They aren't going to want to see you after a while,
because they know you're gonna try to convince them all to become
your down-lines or to buy your products.  Eventually, you will
run out of people to sell stuff to,  and you probably have a few
down-lines under you. Your manager says he understands your
dilemma, but convinces you to stay with it,  because you'll
eventually see it start to pay off.  Well,  to make your monthly
quota,  you have to buy some products YOURSELF.  And, when you're
totally in denial,  you fool yourself into believing that you
actually needed the products that you bought,  or that the
products are better than any of the usual products you buy more
cheaply from the supermarket.  Thus,  in the end,  you are your
best customer in these programs,  and you'll be losing more money
than making it.  Of course your up-lines are going to try to
convince you to stay,  because they're the ones who have only to
gain by you staying on. Mind you,  that's what happens for the
"average" MLM worker.  I have  heard stories of how others have
been able to make as much as $50,000 per year off of an MLM like
AMWAY.  But those people have quit their day jobs,  setup a
regular office,  placed ads in newspapers and magazines, etc.
They've gone all-out.  If you think that an MLM is an easy way to
make lots of money,  forget it.  It's hard work,  just like
starting any other business which sells products.  If you've got
an extraordinary product which sells itself,  then you'll have
yourself some earnings for a while,  until that product becomes
trite.  But if you just have a bunch of high priced garbage,
then you'll find it very difficult trying to sell them.

   There are also some not-so-legitimate MLM's out there.  I
think I heard that there are about 2,000 new MLM's popping up
every year.  But there are also perhaps 1999 old ones dying every
year as well.  Be warned of the following situation,  which is a
REAL scam:  Someone approaches you about a great new MLM.  They
say that there is NO selling whatsoever in it!  They explain it
to you.  You pay a monthly due of $10.  You find 10 other people
to "manage" under yourself,  each of them paying $10 monthly
dues.  You encourage your down-lines to go out and do the same.
You will make 20% commission on each of your down-line's monthly
dues. So if you have 10 down-lines, each paying $10/mo,  then
you're making $10/mo. (subtracting out the $10 that you have to
pay in).  You will also make a commission on each of their
down-line's monthly dues.  And so on... Eventually,  this pyramid
spreads out,  and you begin to see lots of money,  supposedly.
It seems like such an amazing deal that nobody would pass it up.
But the problems that occur are:


  1) This is illegal in the U.S.  It's basically the same scam
that was revealed in "A",  above ("Make Money Fast" scam).


  2) Theoretically, the base of the pyramid becomes so broad that
there would be no more people remaining in the world to become
their down-lines,  so the largest part of the pyramid is paying
$10/mo and not getting anything in return.  Eventually,  the
base of the pyramid falls out,  and so does the "new" base, etc.
The pyramid collapses,  and in the end,  the only ones that have
made any money are at the top. The rest of the people have lost a
considerable amount of money.


  3) You have to sign up at least 5 people or more to just
break-even.  To be making much more money, you need to have many
others directly under you.  Most of the $10 dues goes to the guy
in charge of the scam directly,  without trickling upwards.  The
rest of the people are promised money,  but seldom receive any.
It's basically like someone coming to you and saying,  "Give me
$10/mo."



Annotated Bibliography of Internet Scam Information
===================================================

The following is a list of scam-related information available on
the net via WWW, gopher, FTP, email, etc.  Currently,  it's a
small list, but will grow in the future:

* The U.S. Postal Service's web site on consumer fraud:
  http://www.usps.gov/websites/depart/inspect/consmenu.htm

  This web site came as a pleasant surprise.  It contains a
wealth of  information on such topics as mail fraud,  MLM/Pyramid
schemes, work-at-home scams, etc.  It contains links to other web
sites that have more information.  It's definitely a MUST for
further reading. They backed-up everything I said in this report,
hitting most of  the major points that I did.


* The National Fraud Information Center:
  http://www.seamless.com/talf/ftc/ftc.html

  This web site provides information on many specific scams or
categories of scams.  If you think that someone's selling you a
scam,  first check here.  For example,  if you're thinking about
joining a  truck driving school,  they have an article about it
which explains what you should watch out for.



Closing Remarks
===============

Finally,  if you KNOW that someone is posting a scam,  send an
email message to their system administrator to get their accounts
deleted.  They have no business being on the net,  and it's your
right,  as a citizen of "the net",  to get rid of them.  For
example,  if the guy's address is "user21@bovine.moo.com", then
you should send a message to "root@bovine.moo.com" and
"postmaster@bovine.moo.com",  as well as "root@moo.com" and
"postmaster@moo.com".  This way, you are ensured that your email
message will go through.  "root" is a special username on most
systems meaning, "system administrator".  And "postmaster" is the
person who is in charge of netnews postings.

If you see a scam posted to a newsgroup,  simply write a
follow-up letter to the article,  and insert the sentence, "This
is a SCAM!"  That's all you have to do.  It takes no more than 20
seconds of your time.  WARNING!!

If you do something like this,  you must prepare yourself for
retaliation! If you have any personal information available on
the net,  remove it. If your ".plan" or ".signature" file reveals
information about your real identity,  where you live,  your
phone #, etc.,  then you might want to remove it temporarily.
You wouldn't want a crazy scam-artist to  get a hold of your home
address or phone #.

I hope this file has helped... If you want to ask me any specific
questions,  I'm here.  Fire away!


Ciao for now,

 - Steve Weigand
   (weigand@marlin.ssnet.com)