There’s an email purporting to be from a court, claiming that the recipient appear on the date and time indicated in the email. This email has an attachment notification that is harmful to the user’s computer if the file is downloaded and extracted. The zip file is loaded with a Malware executable.
The email is definitely easy to spot as a scam as there are grammar issues and there’s no reference number or other detailed information that validates you as the witness, plaintiff and or defendant.
Actual Email
Notice to appear in court,
Hereby you are notified that you have been scheduled
to appear for your hearing that will take place
in the court of St.Louis in April 05, 2014 at 11:30 am.Please bring all documents and witnesses relating
to this case with you to court on your hearing date.The copy of the court notice is attached to this letter,
please, download and read it thoroughly.
Note: The case may be heard by the
judge in your absence if you do not come.Yours very truly,
DUNCAN Warren
Clerk of court
I left the email intact to show how easy it is to spot a scam from how it is crafted. The email is from infonum1485@southtexasinternetlawyers.com which also looks suspicious because you’re requested to appear in a St. Louis court and the email suggests it’s from lawyers in South Texas.
This is not a well-crafted scam, but it will fool some people. This scam is intended to panic people in believing it’s real and the attached document is real court documents which is not.
If you receive an email like the one above, delete it and or mark it as spam. Beware of different incarnations of this type of email that has an attachment that is harmful to the user’s computer.
this is really useful thanks for sharing these scams with us, oops real scam.
Does this only happen through email?
As of now, it appears to be in the form of an email.
I have been taken in my email scams in the past but luckily realised at the last minute.
As a general rule of thumb, anything that is truly important will come through your letterbox and not via an email, even if you are expecting some form of correspondence, be cautious.