'TIS THE SEASON TO BE WARY

ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED BY THE SOMERS RECORD (12-15-22)- Please remember small business in your town during this coronavirus pandemic

     I feel that part of my job as a journalist (and I use that term so loosely that it slipped out of my hand and rolled under the couch) is to keep readers informed and aware. And the holiday season should be a time of heightened vigilance of scams, shams, spams and flim-flams that can mean very special gifts for e-criminals around the world.

     I'm ordinarily a fairly trusting person. I injured my back once trusting someone as far as I could throw them. I want to believe what people tell me. I want to believe conspiracy theories so that I can fit in with all those smart folks who don't have particularly high standards of proof.

     In fact just the other day I got a message from a Mr. Philip, not sure if that's his first name or his last name. He identified himself as a barrister and asked me to contact him by a different email address, which he included a link for, so that he could give me a more detailed explanation. He didn't mention what the explanation was for, so I assume he's going to explain all that in his explanation. It's the sort of thing barristers do, so I'm pretty sure it's legit.

     I also received an email from Ms. Yuen Cheng, in which she said, "Hi." I'm planning to respond, and I already know what my reply will be. There's no link or attachment or anything, so I think she may simply have something inside her head that doesn't plan on coming out. I'll let you know in a few months when we reach the end of a sentence.

     I also heard from Aisha Muammar Gaddafi, "the only daughter of the embattled president of Libya." She's now a refugee in Burkina Faso, and I don't have time to give you the whole story, but suffice it to say that there's $27.5 MILLION DOLLARS in an account that could be mine if I play my cards right. I don't know how or why she chose me, but I have mentioned to several people in the past that I would LOVE to have $27.5 million dollars, and I guess word got around.

     There are ways to protect yourself from online grifters. Try not to share too much information about yourself on social media, or recount every detail about your life in a public weekly newspaper column. Look for subtle differences of one or two missing letters in email return addresses that can signal a bogus correspondence. If you get an email saying your Prime account has been hacked and it's from "scAmazon," it may be fraudulent. Some have reported phone calls from the IRS, but it's important to know that if the IRS was prone to calling people by phone, I would have had to change my number 20 times by now.

     You can easily identify scammers because after the year 2016, no one uses courtesy or politeness in any form anymore except if they want you to click on a malware link. Miss Kissi Becker Sirleaf writes, for instance, "Dearest one, How are you and every members of your family? I hope fine? Good to write you." I have to admit, she had me at "Hello." And since her father in West Africa is a "highly reputable business magnet," I feel somewhat attracted to her situation.

     They already know your buying habits, and may try to appeal to you using products or subjects that they know you like, so answer emails and correspondence that refer only to things you hate.  Remember that cybercriminals are a relentless bunch, where only the most successful survive, and the ones who fall by the wayside are the ones who can't hack it. They see you when you're sleeping, they know when you're awake. They know when your password is bad or good, so beware for goodness sake. Sometimes a little popup appears asking me if I would like to accept cookies, and what my cookie preferences are, but there's no menu to tell them that I am not a big fan of raisins.

     They also know that your pet's name is probably your password, with the current year added on. That's why your pet's name should always be more than eight characters and include a number, a capital letter, a lower case letter and a symbol. And you should change your pet's name every two months. I hope this will make you think twice about clicking a link from an email address that you don't recognize. If you liked this article, let me know, and please include your Social Security number so that I know it's really you.