Hooray! I'm a MILLIONAIRE!

I just received an email from  the "Storage Officer" at Chicago's O'Hare International Airport, Mr. John Munez.   He tells me that a box containing over five million dollars is waiting for me to claim it:

In view of your inability to receive your package with registration # UK8100AF from National UK Lottery London united kingdom,originally scheduled to be delivered to you by an agency, city express delivery (c.e.d). This package in a golden metal box valued $5,316,000 USD (five million three hundred and sixteen thousand dollars mistakenly arrived at Chicago O'Hare International Airport terminal 5 via British airways flight no.BA297 from Heathrow airport London sometime ago. The package with registration no, UK8100AF has been cleared by the USA customs and is 100% legitimate. The agency, attached to the airport, city express delivery (c.e.d) who delivered your package to your address have just return the package to our storage facility at the Chicago Airport, due to incomplete address.

Please reconfirm these information's;

 The letter goes on asking for my full name, Internet address, phone number, the airport nearest to my location, and my occupation.    It concludes:

Therefore, writing to inform you that the days of grace has elapsed and we shall begin to charge the daily storage fee of $25usd. Please call Golden Williams on (773) 455-7017 Extension 21 terminal 5 or  contact Email address: (chicagoairport92@yahoo.co.uk) to release this package directly to you.

Note that this notice serves as our last recovery notice to you as our department will be compelled to shortlist your package as an unclaimed consignment, and maybe forfeited.

Note: Delivery of your package from the airport to your residential address is free.

I thought that last part was a nice touch.  They're going to deliver my five million dollar gold box for free!

Full contact information was included, of course ... including a yahoo.co.uk email address (which was NOT the gmail.com address from which the email was sent).

(What, you think I don't look at the header details?)

Now, I sure don't want to miss my chance to pick up an easy five mill ... and take advantage of that tasty "Free Delivery" offer!   But I'm a little uncomfortable replying to either email address, or calling any of the phone numbers which were included in the contact information.   So I did what I always do.

I reported it to the FBI.

There's a division of the Feebies called IC3 (Internet Crime Complaint Center) which accepts reports of larcenous attempts to either phish us or otherwise separate us from our hard earned dollars.  I filled out a long report (online) with much of the information "Mr Munez" was hoping I would send him.  Let the FEDS call the phone numbers, reply to the various email addresses, and talk to the REAL "Storage Office" at Terminal 5, Extension 11, located at 10000 West O'Hare.

It was a very impressive letter, but there are still some telling characteristics which cast doubt on the authenticity of this letter:

• They didn't include my name
• There were grammatical errors in the letter ("Please reconfirm these information's;")
• The "yahoo.co.uk" email address doesn't seem a reasonable place to reply to the Chicago Airport
• No security arrangements were expressed nor implied .. to send me five million dollars?
• They were careful to mention that this box "has been cleared by the USA customs and is 100% legitimate"!
•  ????? !
• They needed my internet address (email), presumably because they sent this to so many people they couldn't be sure which one had self-identified as a greedy, larcenous sucker.

All of this ignores the most obvious twist.  I know I don't have any dead rich uncles in England who would have sent me a buncha boddle ina box of bullion.  (Sorry, couldn't resist the iteration.)   They know I know that.  This is a patent effort to encourage my participation in larceny.

In short, it's just another attempt to phish out my personal information.   It's Identity Theft.

I have to admit, it's a slick twist, from their point of view.  They don't ask for bank account or credit card information (although, it's a "first contact" ... and there is a mention of $25/day storage fees, which would probably be required from me 'before the item is released from storage').

And even if I balk at actually sending them money after step 2 or 3 or 4 in the scheme ... they might still have enough information to open bank or credit card accounts in my name.


In a quick search of the internet, I haven't been able to find reports of similar attempts.   But   if you receive an email like this, I encourage you (and tell your family and friends) that before they reply to ANY "out of the blue" emails, they might want to spend a minute and look at the FBI's "Looks Too Good To Be True" website.

If it looks too good to be true ... it probably isn't.