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<body style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space; padding: constant(safe-area-inset-top) constant(safe-area-inset-right) constant(safe-area-inset-bottom) constant(safe-area-inset-left);">
<div style="font-family: Avenir, Helvetica, 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Avenir, sans-serif, -gh-fontmarker; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-weight:normal;background-color:#FFFFFF;" data-ghheaderwithclosetag="div">Academia is all a fake of having recommendations from the right people. If the department chair asks a grad student for a favor, you’re likely to jump at the opportunity. Also, the first email was super specific, which would cause some people to suspend disbelief later. This isn’t a typical syntax screwed up scam message:</div><div style="font-family: Avenir, Helvetica, 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Avenir, sans-serif, -gh-fontmarker; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-weight:normal;background-color:#FFFFFF;" data-ghheaderwithclosetag="div"><br></div><div style="font-family: Avenir, Helvetica, "Helvetica Neue", Arial, Avenir, sans-serif, -gh-fontmarker; font-size: 16px; font-weight: normal; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);" data-ghheaderwithclosetag="div"><i>I am in a meeting right now working on the study of the development of children of same-sex couples, based on data from the US Census. That is why I am contacting you through mail. I should have called you, but calls are restricted during the meeting. I don't know when the meeting will be rounding up, And i want you to help me out on something very important right away.</i><br><br>Yes. If you stop to think about it, it’s got a few problems. But lots of people don’t stop to think when the guy holding their budget strings asks for a quick favor.</div><div style="font-family: Avenir, Helvetica, "Helvetica Neue", Arial, Avenir, sans-serif, -gh-fontmarker; font-size: 16px; font-weight: normal; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);" data-ghheaderwithclosetag="div"><br></div><div style="font-family: Avenir, Helvetica, "Helvetica Neue", Arial, Avenir, sans-serif, -gh-fontmarker; font-size: 16px; font-weight: normal; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);" data-ghheaderwithclosetag="div">I’ve sense heard of lots of other variations of this. All managed to pull in multiple people who responded. Organizations don’t tend to reward questioning your boss.<br><br>On Feb 13, 2019 at 15:20:33 PST, Randall Gellens <mailmate@randy.pensive.org> wrote:<br><br>> On 13 Feb 2019, at 13:46, Kee Hinckley wrote:<div style="font-style: normal;">> </div><div style="font-style: normal;">> > The intro text was professionally done. It was specifically targeted </div><div style="font-style: normal;">> > for a sociology department. Followup text was sloppier and clearly </div><div style="font-style: normal;">> > done on the fly. She managed to alert other students and stopped at </div><div style="font-style: normal;">> > least one person who was just about to buy the cards. The scam works </div><div style="font-style: normal;">> > very well.</div><div style="font-style: normal;">> </div><div style="font-style: normal;">> I'm continually surprised how gullible people are. Why would someone's </div><div style="font-style: normal;">> department chair or other boss send email from a meeting asking the </div><div style="font-style: normal;">> person to purchase gift cards? I know there's always a rationale in the </div><div style="font-style: normal;">> email ("I'm stuck in this meeting, I need to pay my baby sitter, won't </div><div style="font-style: normal;">> have time later, etc.") but it's never seemed remotely plausible to me. </div><div style="font-style: normal;">> I know people fall for the tax scams, where they get a call from someone </div><div style="font-style: normal;">> claiming to be from the U.S. tax collection agency (or national police </div><div style="font-style: normal;">> or something) and pressuring the person to buy gift cards to pay a tax </div><div style="font-style: normal;">> lien or warrant for arrest or something, and that has always seemed so </div><div style="font-style: normal;">> wildly ridiculous that I'm always amazed people fall for it.</div><div style="font-style: normal;">> </div><div style="font-style: normal;">> --Randall</div><div style="font-style: normal;">> _______________________________________________</div><div style="font-style: normal;">> mailmate mailing list</div><div style="font-style: normal;">> mailmate@lists.freron.com</div><div style="font-style: normal;">> https://lists.freron.com/listinfo/mailmate</div><div style="font-style: normal;"><br></div><br></div></body></html>