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Currently it is unclear how far back the origin of scam letters date. The oldest reference to the origin of scam letters could be found at the Spanish Prisoner scam. [1] This scam dates back to the 1580s, where the fictitious prisoner would promise to share non-existent treasure with the person who would send him money to bribe the guards.
Email scams posing as the Internal Revenue Service were also used to steal sensitive data from U.S. taxpayers. [64] Social networking sites are a prime target of phishing, since the personal details in such sites can be used in identity theft ; [ 65 ] In 2007, 3.6 million adults lost US$3.2 billion due to phishing attacks. [ 66 ]
Email fraud (or email scam) is intentional deception for either personal gain or to damage another individual using email as the vehicle. Almost as soon as email became widely used, it began to be used as a means to de fraud people, just as telephony and paper mail were used by previous generations.
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Counterfeit consumer goods are goods illegally made or sold without the brand owner's authorization, often violating trademarks.Counterfeit goods can be found in nearly every industry, from luxury products like designer handbags and watches to everyday goods like electronics and medications.
The Maria Duval scam is one of the most successful mail scams in history, having defrauded millions of people out of at least $200 million over twenty years. Targeting sick and elderly people through a combination of personalized letters and personal information databases, it has been shut down in the United States in 2016, but is still ongoing in many countries.
Technical support scams rely on social engineering to persuade victims that their device is infected with malware. [15] [16] Scammers use a variety of confidence tricks to persuade the victim to install remote desktop software, with which the scammer can then take control of the victim's computer.
Consumer NZ is governed by an elected board of seven members who hold office for three years. The current chair is Richard Aston. The deputy chair is Sue Kedgley. [8] As part of Consumers’ work on behalf of all NZ consumers, they regularly make submissions to Government and statutory authorities on a wide range of issues affecting consumers.