New PayPal Scam

United States
October 27, 2011 8:18pm CST
I just received a new PayPal scam and the scammers/cooks are getting dumber. One would think if you were going to try and work a scam that one would know bellow is the wrong word. There is a big difference between the meanings of below and bellow. Here is what it said: Dear Member, [i]On Oct, 28 2011, the credit card you use was removed from your PayPal account. If you did not want this credit card to be removed please click on the link bellow and undo the changes:[/i] I did forward it to the paypal spoof address even although I am pretty sure it is a scam and did not click on any part of it. Have you received any spam emails trying to con you and it is so obviously a phony when sender cannot ever spell? Just a warning to be on the alert for Paypal scams.
3 people like this
17 responses
@owlwings (43915)
• Cambridge, England
28 Oct 11
The first and most telling sign of a scam is when the email appears to come from PayPal or a Bank and addresses you as "Dear Member" or "Dear Account Holder" or something like that. PayPal and any Bank you are a member of knows your name and will always use it when sending out messages of this sort. Even if a message is genuinely from PayPal, always log in to your account by typing www.paypal.com into the address bar. You will see immediately if there really is a problem with the account as soon as you log in. If there is no warning message saying the same thing as the email, then the email is a hoax and you can safely ignore and delete it.
2 people like this
@owlwings (43915)
• Cambridge, England
28 Oct 11
The other thing which one always can (and SHOULD) do is to hover the mouse over any link in the email. The destination it will REALLY go to will show on the status bar at the bottom. It will probably be a long string of rubbish, possibly with the word 'paypal' in it somewhere but the actual domain name will NOT be anything like PayPal and it CERTAINLY won't be an 'https://' (secure) link!
2 people like this
• United States
28 Oct 11
Thank you for the excellent response and comments
@zralte (4178)
• India
28 Oct 11
Good tips, as always, owlwings. Sometimes we become careless and not check things. I'm glad to be reminded to be careful from time to time. Thankfully, I have never been scammed, thanks to people like you and many others who keeps reminding us there are bad people out there.
1 person likes this
• Canada
28 Oct 11
That one's pretty obvious. If I get something that looks convincing, but I know is not, I always send it to the reporting e-mail. If I wonder, I ignore the page, go to my account on my own (not using their link) and look for what the scam mentions. Every day I get something from someone telling me that my bank of America account was suspended. I have an account with B of A, but I'm sure not everyone who gets these message does.
2 people like this
• Canada
28 Oct 11
I get the occasional one from a bank I don't deal with, but many from B of A. I hope that's just a coincidence. I get a few from PayPal that I ignore, but not many. I have NEVER gotten one from a Canadian bank.
1 person likes this
@GardenGerty (157545)
• United States
28 Oct 11
That is always a sign to me that something is a scam. Misspellings are pretty good clues to the ignorance of the scammers.
2 people like this
• United States
28 Oct 11
Pretty dumb of them!
1 person likes this
@GardenGerty (157545)
• United States
28 Oct 11
Unfortunately there are always people who will fall for it. That is why they keep on doing it.
@Lakota12 (42600)
• United States
28 Oct 11
thanks for the heads up and yup they were dumb lololol most of my scam mail goes to scam folder
2 people like this
• Philippines
28 Oct 11
Hello whiteheather39! Thanks for the information. This serves as an eye-opener for a newbie like me. I am now aware on what to do whenever i encounter this kind of fraudulent act. I just have to be vigilant enough in order to avoid scams like this.
2 people like this
• United States
28 Oct 11
This one was obviously a scam. However 5 years ago I got one that looked exactly like a email from PayPal and I fell for it. Thank heavens my bank was on the alert and it caught the scam as someone in Canada was trying to withdraw money. So now I am VERY careful.
1 person likes this
• Philippines
28 Oct 11
Hi whiteheather39! Thank you for this information. I haven't received this kind of alert yet and I am thankful that I read your post before I do. I am really cautious of these things.
2 people like this
• United States
28 Oct 11
You can never be too careful.
1 person likes this
@MsTickle (25180)
• Australia
3 Nov 11
Hahahaha. Idiots! Thanks for the heads up whiteheather. Unfortunately, it seems that quite a few people fall for these scams. Too sad really.
@Hatley (163781)
• Garden Grove, California
28 Oct 11
hi evidently these latest spammer do not even know how to spell or correct errors and this tips me off that it is always a scam. I got the same message ,reported it then deleted it too.I make errors a lot myself here but try my best to proofread and fix them. but the scammers are so crooked and eager to spam and make illegal money I guess they do not care.
@celticeagle (158958)
• Boise, Idaho
28 Oct 11
With all the scams I have gotten from Paypal I now forward everything to them. They never send me anything so I know it is a scame if I get anything. I think I have gotten the one you mention also. Whoever this scammer is they definitely do not know the language.
@kodukodu84 (1569)
• Malaysia
28 Oct 11
Oh I received this kind of scam many times before, but I never really cared. I know the way how actually Paypal contact you and they even will not address you as dear member. I used to get different kind of Paypal scam before and what I do is just delete them. Nowadays, I don't get any anymore, I think the scammer decided to ignore me because I never responded anyway
1 person likes this
• India
28 Oct 11
thanks for giving this useful information...!
1 person likes this
• United States
28 Oct 11
You're welcome
• India
28 Oct 11
Ya,I also received a mail from paypal ( scam ) and I already knew that it is a scam coz I havent used that id for paypal.And they were asling me for my all info. And that is simple to understand that the id I dnt use for paypal account,coulnt get any mail from paypal.So,we should avoid these type of scams and plz do not give any info of ur account to anyone... Thanx..
1 person likes this
@voracious (624)
• Philippines
4 Nov 11
Obviously scammer uses email such as paypal@yahoo.com, paypal@gmail.com and so on. The legitimate email of paypal as far as I know is always end with @paypal.com
• United States
4 Nov 11
Obviously these scammers do not know there is a BIG difference between the meaning of below and bellow!!!
@vasumathi (436)
• India
28 Oct 11
This is really a warning message to everyone. Thanks for sharing
1 person likes this
• United States
28 Oct 11
You're welcome...thanks
1 person likes this
@ram_cv (16513)
• India
28 Oct 11
I think there are too many of these scams floating around. Some of these are really dumb. But I am sure novices do fall for such mails and that is why these mails are still doing round. All we can do is whenever such mails come, we alert the others to it. Cheers! Ram
• India
28 Oct 11
This was never happen to me in paypal. I am using my paypal account since 6months. Anyway i will take this into consideration and be careful in these types of scams...
@nihakang (10)
• Indonesia
28 Oct 11
like this scam is really annoying, i've also received email like this, but i ignore it, because it's pointless, so i think we should be more careful if we received emails like this...