Random Thought #44 - What Is With All This Spam?

I never used to get spam on this blog (or my other blog come to that).

But just before the A To Z Challenge started up this year I decided to make it easier for people to comment by letting anyone comment (included those who wish to remain anonymous) and removing the word verification thing.

And within the first week I had spam appearing in my inbox.

But it was only like a spam comment a week.

But in the last couple of weeks I'm getting spam comments nearly everyday - usually with some websites listed where I can either get a virus for my computer or buy something that may or may not be fake.

The only spam I like comes in a tin!


Update 16/11/12 - I'm currently getting about a dozen spam comments a day! A DAY! So I am currently getting all emails that alert me to comments sent to my junk mail folder. And then each day I have a quick scroll through the new ones to see if there are any legitimate comments.

So if you leave a comment anonymously (and you are not a spammer) I might not notice for a while

S Is For Spam

And I'm not talking about the tinned meat... although I do like that sort of Spam... it's very nice in sandwiches. I could probably write an entire post about eating Spam...

But that's not what I was talking about. Spam - the crap that infiltrates your emails and tries to plant itself on your blog comments.

I'd never really had spam on my blog comments... until I changed the settings for the A To Z Challenge so that anyone could comment. Now I know some of the regulars are probably thinking that you haven't seen any spam. That's because it doesn't actually appear on my blog... I just get emails telling me that a comment was added... but when you look for it it has gone.

I wouldn't have know that it was spam if I hadn't have copied and pasted the comment to Google and translated it... it was in Russian.

The junk folder on my emails is usually full of online casino invitations, messages from banks and the occasional pharmaceutical related email (I'm female therefore I don't have much use for that sort of thing ;) ).

The messages from banks usually tell me that my online account is going to be closed unless I click this dodgy link and give them all my personal information. In a lot of these cases I don't even have an account with that particular bank.

I'm not trying to help these cretins (I can't believe I spelt that right first time!) but it would help if they could spell - posibile? Imformation? You seriously believe that a real bank wouldn't spell check these things?

But occasionally you get some real gems that make you laugh. I've had the odd one or two telling me about some long lost estranged relative who had died... and I'm the first living relation he has been able to find... but the inheritance is all tied up in probate and things... and I just have to give them a huge chunk of my hard earned cash and they can unlock it... and then I'll never hear from them again!

But the funniest one I've ever received is one that I actually mentioned in this random thought. I actually laughed out loud at it. Back in November 2011 I received an email from the financial adviser of...

Wait for it...

Colonel Gaddafi's son!

Apparently he had fled his country and was having trouble getting at the cash he's hidden away in a secret account and was I mug enough to give him money... I'd be made a partner and get loads of money out of it... I think not somehow.

I laugh about these things but I feel sorry for the people who are taken in by some of the more convincing ones.

Has anyone else had any entertaining spam?