Is this email a scam?

ExaltedWombat

Bit of a worry that you even had to ask! Of course it’s a scam.

Bit harsh, ExaltedWombat. Yes, it’s a scam, but surely it’s good that the OP came here to have her suspicions confirmed and has acted on them. We can all be taken in by things sometimes, no matter how savvy we are.

Strangely enough, I did get a WA message from my son saying he had problems with his phone. I asked him a couple of questions only he would know the answers to. We had a laugh after but he agreed ‘you can’t be too careful’

That is a scam . If you still have the original email forward it to [email protected]

That’s the national cyber crime team email. They can then trace and block the sender .

I had similar one ,which was supposed to come from my daughter.
She said that she needed money for an emergency .
The language was correct , but didn't have her usual pacy pattern - neither did she use her name for me .
I asked the sender to send her pet name and the pet names of her siblings to verify her identity .
No response .
One of my old friends does send those sort of requests !

One of the things that I have done is have one particular word in another language , that I have with my son. He travels a great deal and therefore if I got an email saying he was stuck somewhere or his phone was broken it could actually be true. But by just asking him for a comment, if it is him, he will give the word we know between us. Have had a couple that gave his name without the specific word so that was a scam! We have changed the word over time , but think it is a help. I do not have a photo on any internet things and am very distrustful of any unexpected messages. Very sad that we have to be so wary about any message these days but that is the way we have to be.

My Dd had a What's App message from her 'daughter' saying her phone had died she was using a friends phone and could she send her some money- my daughter was 19, at uni, single and def had no children!🙄

Anyth8ng to do with gift cards is a well known scam.

chicken

Thank you all for confirming my suspicions. I’ve contacted my friend, by phone, and her tech savvy son is sorting things out for her. It’s horrible to have to be so suspicious of simple communications. I feel that I’m becoming a cynic even though I don’t want o be.

Unfortunately you only have to be scammed once to become very cynical. I was scammed and thankfully got my money back from the bank, but now I'm horribly suspicious. I hope none of my friends ever needs my help urgently as I'd be very reluctant to help without strong evidence it was them.

Its a scam. As others have said let her know she has been hacked. If you have her phone number you can phone her or SMS.

Scam! It even sounds ridiculous... delete it and anything else like it at any time...same with scam texts! We just use whats app for any important stuff

Scamerooney. Horrifying thing on radio the other day. People being groomed for a scam. They actually were asked by the bank, which had been trying to tell them it was a scam, to hold up a piece of paper under their own face. Paper saying : The bank has warned me it might be as scam.but I want to go ahead with this transaction. They had to send pic of this to the bank. They went ahead with scam and lost £85k. The woman scammed had been so groomed her first reaction was to feel hurt because the scammer had been so friendly. It was only later she thought about the money.

Definitely a scam. A friend got caught out by a similar scam and lost hundreds of pounds .

I got a text yesterday from my "son" saying he'd lost his phone and telling me to ring him on a new number. Another scam.

Good that you’ve asked for advice before proceeding. Had similar 20 years ago before spam and scamming was widely known about.
‘Friend’ saying they urgently needed help. I replied. Infected all of my email addresses, who were then also spammed. Had to delete account and alert all contacts to the problem. Was a pain. I learned my lesson.

To the OP, this is DEFINITELY a scam, forward the email to [email protected] and then delete it.

Folk have suggested that you email back, this is likely to just be read by the scammer, of which there are sadly far too many on the planet. If you can contact them by phone for a warning, that's the more secure way.

In MY world, I'd have a couple of scammers a week executed (pour encourager les autres), but give them the option to try and save themselves by donating say £20K for charity. Then I'd say, oops, sorry, you've been scammed . . .

Allira

Delete it!!

and then block this email address

Sign up to which scam alerts if you read your emails regularly signup.which.co.uk/wlp-scamalert-newsletter If not then keep an eye on their page www.which.co.uk/news/article/the-latest-scam-alerts-from-which-aBRLy2b02WkC

Scam interceptors this week also highlighted one where people who had been refused a loan were being contacted and told they could get the loan if they bought an insurance policy - the scammers were only asking for £30-50, but from people who could not even spare that much.

Forward it to
[email protected]
Then block and delete it

Scam, I had one similar and what was scary was at the beginning the person wrote exactly like my friend, it was so convincing. I forwarded it to the place you report scam emails to. As soon as they asked me to purchase a gift card I knew it wasn't my friend. They would never ask me to do this.

I had one of those and almost fell for it because it was such a lovely person I wouldn't have dreamt they would be asking for something if it wasn't really urgent and really true But there was something didn't ring true So I phoned her up and said did you send me an email asking for this? And she said oh no you've had one as well And all her contacts had had this because her email had been hacked so yes do tell her pull up

please ignore pull up at the end of that sentence i'm using speech to text and it was supposed to be. Full stop

That's a good tip madeleine45, thanks.

I got a text, supposedly from our vicar, saying he had just arrived for a holiday in the holy land and his wallet had been stolen. Could I send some money and he'd repay me when he got back.
A call to his wife revealed that they were actually in London!
Another scam!

The clue is in the asking for money.