Well, I can see how people would be susceptible. Look at how many of them play the lottery every week, thinking they actually have a chance of winning the jackpot. 
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So today, DH got a survey from “Dick’s Sporting Goods.” If he completed it, he’d be entered into a sweepstakes to win some doodad. He completed the survey, and at the end it asked him for his credit card info to pay for shipping, “in case” he was the winner.
Yeah, we fixed it, after not only the “shipping charges” but some other item appeared on his credit card.
His mother didn’t raise him right.
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My husband got a call from a 1-800 number listed as BofA. A guy with a thick Indian accent said they needed to verify some account information. First question was,
“Do you have a BofA account or not?” 
Mr. hung up on the scammer.
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Thanks for sharing. I’m so afraid DH will fall for something. I’m reading a lot of these posts to him!
Exactly!!!
While people might be suspicious of commercial surveys that ask for a Cc number, the scammers employ the same tactic by sending political “surveys” that request a small donation at the end. People can be willing to make a donation to their cause which (and the cc info) ends up in the hands of the scammers.
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If you’re gonna scam people, learn to do it right!
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Shoot, I think I just got scammed. I got a party invitation via email from an old friend who lost his wife last year and has been hard to reach. It was “Punchbowl,” which is a legitimate site, but I don’t think this email was on the up and up. When I clicked on the link, it asked me for my password to either AOL, Outlook, etc. I typed in the AOL password but it said it wasn’t correct. Something looked a little off. I immediately went to my AOL account and changed my password, so I think I’m OK, but ugh. I can’t believe I fell for it.
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If you use that password on other sites, don’t forget to go there and change your password, as well.
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It happens. You recovered quickly. No harm, no foul.
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I for the same thing yesterday, from a friend who no longer lives in the area. I tried to open the li k but it didn’t work. Then I messaged her but haven’t heard back. Fortunately no password info was exchanged
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“All legitimate Online Invitations and Digital Greeting Cards sent from Punchbowl via email will come from mail@mail.punchbowl.com. Official support emails will come from help@punchbowl.com.”
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Thanks. I looked at the email of the person it was coming from and it was legit. Sadly that likely means they were hacked.
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Same in my case. I used the email address to ask my friend about it, and he responded in a way that I know it was really him.
I guess legitimate Punchbowl invitations come directly from Punchbowl.com, not through anyone else’s email account.
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I fell for a scam and can’t believe it. I work in a small organization and we hired a new person in the fall. A couple of months later, she emailed me and said “surf city, I want to change my direct deposit to a new bank account” and listed the new account number and routing. It had her email signature annd title and was formatted like the other dozens of emails we exchange every day.
Since we mostly work remotely, I just went in to the payroll site and changed the numbers.
That prompted an automatic email to her, she called me to ask why I changed her direct deposit, and I found out she had not sent the original email!
The payroll company says they get calls like this multiple times a day. I feel so stupid, but I have no idea where they got the info as her email address etc were not even on our website yet.
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Wow, that is scary.
Last night on Facebook, I was texting an old work colleague I hadn’t talked to in a long time. This morning, I got a call and the caller ID was the name of his daughter. I figured it was just him since sometimes a family member’s name appears. So I picked it up and it was one those, “You need to update your Google listing” calls. But how weird that I just talked to him! And the daughter’s name isn’t Anne Smith or something, it’s a little unusual. A little too coincidental!
Are all your work email addresses firstname.lastname@company.com?
Unfortunately that’s a very common format and therefore very easy for scammers to guess. They look up people on LinkedIn or other sites, find out the company they work for, and guess the email address.
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My first thought was, a former (or current?!) employee who was familiar with your company’s email format and possibly had exchanged emails in the past with your colleague, so was familiar with her style. Or both of the above.
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