Hello.
Hope you are keeping fine. Am sorry for not writing you before leaving to Johannesburg to help my cousin that she was diagnosed with blood and the X'Ray scan showed an "incidental finding" of tumors in her liver and appear to be Surgery Operation. The news of her illness arrived to me as emergency that she needs family support to keep her life going. I got robbed on my way, My Credit card, cash and other valuables things I have with me got stolen, And the hospital management is demanding for a deposit of 2500 euros before they can carry out the surgery operation to save his life. Please I will be happy if you can assist me with a soft loan of $2000 to make the necessary arrangement for her surgery operation cost on time. before she died here, I promise to pay you back when i return home. I did not take along my phone and it is currently switched off because of the time frame I had to be here...
Please am counting on you and kindly get back to me on time. so that I can email you the details information where the money will be sending to. as soon as possible
Regards,
* * *
This is the text of an email scam sent out under Linda's name to her personal email address book. No, Linda does not have a cousin (male or female? hard to tell) in Johannesburg who was "diagnosed with blood" and no, Linda did not get robbed on her way to South Africa.
Linda's computer is now in the shop being de-bugged and she'll soon have a new personal email address. How annoying!
(The business email, however, will remain info@windbreakhouse.com.)
On the plus side, Linda began to hear from friends--
So glad to hear that you got to go to Johannesburg! Hackers should never try to fake an email from a writer, should they?
--- Andy
I also knew the email wasn't from Linda because it was poorly written. Ha!
--- Jane Wolfe, prairiespirits.blogspot.com
Linda has lost her writing skills.
--- Kevin
Unless you have suddenly taken up English as a Second Language as a quirky hobby, I'm quite sure you didn't write the message . . .
--- Teresa Jordan, www.teresajordan.com
The writer struggled to sound as if English was her first language, but failed miserably. C and I cracked up at the irony of the scammer posing as a writer!
--- K. M. O.
If it did come from you, then you are in so much distress your brain is addled.
--- F. B. from Missouri
You also seemed to have lost your ability to write well in English. That's what happens when you travel overseas! Hah!
--- Laural, www.thewildburro.com
Ah, of course it wasn't from Linda. She would never whimper like that.
--- Faye
Linda was pleased that the reason most people recognized the email was a scam was not because she has no cousin in Johannesburg, but because of the lack of writing quality. Thanks to all the folks who reported this scam and apologies for any inconvenience. Keep your antivirus system updated and scan your system frequently!
Notice posted by Linda's assistant, Tam
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