List of All Well known Scam Methods

**hhhshadydave** · 01-22-2008

Did a search couldnt find anything similar..

yellow= Scam
green= How its performed
purble= How to prevent

These are most of the well known scams and how they are performed this will benefit both sides of the scam, by increasing your knowledge of how to scam while also increasing the knowledge of said person to be scammed..

Scam methods

Phishing Email Scam

This has been the most common scam yet, people regularly got it from nearly the end of 06 in November/December time the ones then had plenty of flaws such as having no background, spelling mistakes, and getting the Blizzard HQ location wrong. The most recent ones however are QUITE 'legit' looking such as having the backgrounds implemented and correcting all the spelling mistakes. But I will keep saying this: BLIZZARD WILL NEVER EVER ASK FOR YOU'RE PASSWORD! So if e-mail had no flaws or anything just give them the finger.

How they do it
They do it by impersonating a Blizzard employee saying that you're account will be banned if the information required isn't given which is a load of bollocks since they will suspend you BEFORE they e-mail you asking for anything and again look above for more reasons.

Trustworthy member impersonation

This one is quite popular but not as popular as the phishing scam. This was first reported during April/June 07 this happens when the scammer tries to impersonate a trustworthy/respectable member of the forum by trying to create an e-mail/IM username near identical to their own such in my case my email is for MSN is: [email protected] my impersonator used hotmail.com when mine is .co.uk . This is often used with middleman since the impersonator can run away with two accounts with ALL the information but it has happen with unsecure trades too.

Prevention of getting scammed

To avoid getting scammed always compare the email with the impersonator with the real one if you aren't sure, if they are correct to be extra safe tell them to either PM you with that account on WoWtrade or post in the thread they are advertising their service. If they cannot do either of these give them the finger and blocked them because in most cases these people are impersonators and scam you at the first chance they will get.

Website lookalike scam

This one is the rarest of the above because this scam is quite hard to pull since let's face it all scammers have an IQ below 5 since they cannot come up with orginality. Anyhow this works when you get an email from 'Blizzard' saying 'click on this link to validate you're account'. Once you click on the url given you will most likely come too a page which looks like the login page for the AM (account management) if you look in the address bar you will most likely see something like '444.hosting' or something similar which is a free website hosting site (HA!). Just type in lickmy in the username box and ba11lz as the password so they know you weren't born yesterday.

IAgreements Scam

Another uncommon one but still happens. This scam is when a person is going to trade or buy an account and they will send an .exe file named 'Iagreements' or something similar which IS a trojan/keylogger. Keyloggers is a program which can record any keystroke you make (YES THIS INCLUDES THE TYPING OF YOU'RE WoW ACCCOUNT INFO!!!). A trojan however is far more danagerous once you've opened the .exe file from the scammer they can and will take over computer and get ANY information they can find. This can include credit card numbers, game accounts info, address and other personal information. Even if it's not named 'IAgreements' don't accept any .exe files from an messenger. They say it is for a 'contract' so if either the buyer/seller scams they can take legal action. (YEAH RIGHT)

Prevention of this scam

To prevent getting infested by one of these danagerous programs I would suggest you get a reputable anti-virus and anti-spyware such as Kapersky or Spy Sweeper which is had great reviews from critics and customers alike. If you aren't interested in purchasing then I would suggest something like SBD or AMD. Type in google to find downloads for these programs.

PayPal Reversal scam

Now this can be quite irritating if you sold you're hard-earned account and you sold it for like money in the hundreds, and two or so weeks later you get an email saying that the money has been reversed and sent back to the buyers account. He/she could of done this by coming up with some bullshit lie like by saying 'My account was hacked and I was unaware of this purchase' or something similar and since PayPal are so gullible they nearly all the time side with the buyer if the seller does not respond because of inactivity from his/hers computer or if inadequate proof is given.

Prevention of this scam

To have a good chance of PayPal siding with you. I would suggest you mention the item you sold to the buyer was virtual and mention that their policy does not cover virtual items, if you give them nigh concrete proof they may side with you and no money will be gone from you're account.
Blizzard 'Mail bot' scam

This is quite a new one I found on 'mmowned' where the scammer posts on the main WoW europe forums or someplace like this and saying that he has found a 'flaw' in the password recovery bot and that you can get someones account information within 20 minutes. More like 20 minutes before they've cleaned you're account of its gold and items. Don't believe any of this bs because you will get you're account destroyed.

'Friend' as middleman scam

This was posted by duude so credit for finding information about it goes to him, it goes like this: You are either selling or trading an account and you get someone whom is interested in trading/buying it you ask what they have or what there bid will be it is up to your to accept it. If you do accept the offer then the buyer/trade will ask if a middleman will be used, and if you say yes then he will refer his 'friend' whom he said might be trustworthy and it may be an impersonator as ones I mentioned above and may link a trustworthy member of this forum or other forums reputation thread and his email may be near identical to his. The usual scenario is that the middleman will ask for all the account(s) information in a private conversation and he will then check it up, and he then (usually) change the password by checking if the sa is correct, and requesting an email change which you will or will not accept. He then tells the buyer the information in said convo and gives the other trade nothing (if you were trading of course) or then tells the buyer to send the cash and he then says he did then they both block you from MSN.

Preventions for this scam:

Always check the email of the middleman whom he claims to be and check the email throughly.
Try and get irl from the both of them such as a telephone number (home phone since you cannot do anything on a mobile), address and IP then you can check if the information is correct on a site (Britons use yell.co.uk)

Claimed email change scam

This one was posted by a guy in this thread (sorry but I cannot recite your username as I'm tired as hell xD). This is done usually after or before you've exchanged account names and passwords and is done when he asks if he can change your email first so you can trust him/her more and once you sent out the confirmation link it should arrive in your inbox and he will confirm the change with screenshots of the account management and scammers these days have turned to HTTP to make it look absolutely flawless so to be actually sure the email is changed to yours go to the password retrieval page on www.wow-europe.com and enter the said account name, then the SA given and the email you requested it to be changed too. If it says the password was successfully retrieved then the guy is legit if however it says the email is invalid then obviously not. Give the guy a finger and report him in the scammers section (with suitable proof of course)

Fake gold farmer scam

This is a recent one I have stumbled across and it involves this:

A person will add you asking if you are renting you're account for lets say 20 euros a day and farm you gold for a bonus (already sounding too good to be true and it probably is) you will probably sound a bit skeptical at this point but say you are, so you give the account information out and he plays for like an hour or so before he says something like this 'a gm /w earlier saying the account will be banned if the following information is not given..' you get the point, and if a did indeed /w the character then you're as sure as hell your not going to give them that kinda information so just block them for a sad attempt at scamming and hopefully none of your items are gone.