I received an email yesterday from a company asking me to join their mystery shopper network. This company was listed in Inc. magazine's top 5000 companies list (URL provided). So, if I'd reply to this email with my full name, address, and phone number, I could start making money. That was red flag #1, and a typical phishing ploy, to ask for identifying information from a stranger (after all, the email was not addressed to me personally). Red flag #2: "Please encourage your family, friends and colleagues to register by responding to this email" by providing the same identifying details. (This is just like chain letters, asking you to forward the email to everyone you know.) Red flag #3: The name of the company was legitimate, but the sender's email address was not exactly the same as what I'd expect the URL to be. (Chcek the email Properties to see where that email originated from.) Red flag #4: the sender's name had a lowercase letter for the start of the surname. Any business person would check to see how their name appeared in the From field.

If you get an email like this, do not click on the links, respond, or forward the email! I did a Google search on the company name to see what showed up. I checked the www.whois.com database to see who owned the URLs listed, to see if the email address and the company URL were registered to the same company, but neither were listed. I checked a few hoaxbusters web sites and www.snopes.com to check the legitimacy of the offer as well. This phishing scam was not listed! So I contacted the real company (I searched for its URL at www.inc.com) and they confirmed the email was a scam. Then I posted the scam on www.breakthechain.org and emailed spam@uce.gov because it's relatively new.

BTW, there are legitimate mystery shopper companies out there. Check out the professional trade association at www.mysteryshop.org.

1  out of 1 found this valuable. Do you find this valuable? Do you?