Thursday, June 10, 2010

Scam Email: Tracey Coey

Here is a great example of an email and how convoluted it gets if you are unfortunate enough to actually reply to their first email. An artist named Frank sent me this (notice the horrible formatting):

Hi Frank,
Good to hear back from you.Yes,I  will definitely like to proceed with the purchase of the work.I  think it is a lovely work that will add a lot of colors to our  wall.

I am presently away in London for my twin  sister's wedding even though it comes at a time when we are  preparing for a big move and also expecting a baby but my presence here means so much to her,I guess you know how intimate identical twins are?she was also in the states when I was  getting married to Terry in December 2001.Also,I would like to  have my baby girl delivered here and i am buying this artwork  for her nursery.

I would be paying you with a  certified Check,please let me have your address,phone number and  the name that would be written on the certified check so that I  can inform my husband that is still shuttling between our home  in Alabama and Cape Town, South Africa on whom to make the  payment payable to.He has just been transferred to head the  Mechanical section of their head Office in Cape town.He would be  quite busy though,but I know he would find a time to send your  payment asap.He loves artworks too.

About the  shipping arrangement?I would have to forward your contact info to the local cartage company that is moving all our properties  from Alabama to S.Africa,so that they would get in touch with  you to arrange shipping details.They will arrange pick up of the  artwork from your studio.(i.e there would be no shipping cost on  the price of the artwork).They are handling all our movement  arrangement and we would not like to move in pieces.

I  hope you understand the arrangement?Please feel free to ask  further questions.I saw your works while searching for artwork  that would be used to beautify our new girl's wall and your work  caught my attention.I cant wait to have it on the  wall!!!

I will look forward to hearing from you so I can  know how best to proceed.
Cheers.
Best  Regards,
Tracey.
They do try to kill you with details, to make their exchange with you seem legitimate and get you to the next step of their scam.

4 comments:

  1. this one made it to me! Ha totally found this was a scam before I opened it!

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  2. Congratulations, Ben! This is where I want to help get ALL artists to - knowing before they even open the darn email... or at least knowing before they have to reply at all to the email.

    Good for you!

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  3. Add the name "Barbara Santos" to the list of scams. I just received one of these emails mentioning the same details from Barbara Santos...Thanks for doing this website!

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  4. Libby, It does seem there are templates of the content of the email, they try and personalize a couple of things (and sometimes are even too lazy to do that) and then make up the name (though I'm surprised how often I see Jessica Bianchi, Tracey Allen, and Stacy Brooks!) and get a disposal email account that they can handle a couple of replies (if the victim believes its for real and starts corresponding) and can dispose of and not be traced. consider Barbara Santos added to the list. Thanks!

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