'I think I've been scammed. My PayPal account is empty when I checked it this morning! The bogus PayPal email got me!' That was the message that jolted my sleepy head into consciousness this morning, the first text message I opened on my mobile when I woke up. It came from Rina (not her real name, hope you understand), a friend from work who started blogging seven months ago at my encouragement (and insistence). My first reaction was panic! What if my PayPal account is empty too? What if I have been scammed myself? I immediately checked my account, scampering to the PC and fumbling with the keyboard as my nerves got the better of me. To add to my terror, my password was rejected twice! A few deep breaths
calmed me a bit to and helped my fingers type the correct password the third time. My hard-earned moolah intact and I was relieved.

Rina, on the other hand, was in tears when I got hold of her. She was saving up for a PS3 for her son, laboring through endless hours of paid posts, reviews and surveys. Now all the money she earned was gone. She fell victim to another mutation of a bogus PayPal email circulating in cyberspace, the same email, by coincidence, that I received a few minutes ago (hence this post). Here is a copy of it for your reference. You may have the same scam PayPal email in your inbox right now.

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Dear Customer,

This e-mail is the notification of recent innovations taken by PayPal
to detect inactive customers and non-functioning mailboxes.

The inactive customers are subject to restriction and removal in the next 1 month.,
Once you have updated your account records your PayPal will not be
interrupted and will continue as normal.
However, failure to update your records will result in account suspension.
This notification expires on 08 September 2008.
Please follow the link below
and renew your account information

Resolution Center

Thank you for using PayPal!
The PayPal Team
Please do not reply to this email.
This mailbox is not monitored and you will not receive a response
----------------------------------------------------------------
Copyright © 1999-2008 PayPal. All rights reserved.

PayPal Email ID PP309-4486

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I have received quite a number of bogus emails since enlisting with PayPal and I have learned my lesson from the first scam email I received. The most important things are these:

PayPal doesn't address its clients as "Dear Customer", "Dear PayPal User", "Dear Member" or "Dear Valued Client". They always address their members by their complete registered names.

Don't give out any information such as your name, account number and password, credit card details, etc. that the email asks for. Once you do that, it's goodbye to your account for these scammers act very fast, emptying accounts the minute they receive the vital information they need.

Don't click on any link provided in the email. Hover your mouse over the link and check for its URL. If in doubt, don't touch the email. What I did when I first received such scams was to contact PayPal and forward the email to them. I then received a prompt reply to my query together with a verification of the email and guidelines on how to avoid being scammed in the future.

If you have already entered valuable information, or clicked the link provided, you take immediate action to protect your identity and data. Report it to PayPal at once. If you only clicked on a link inside of a spoofed email, you may also want to run a security scan on your computer. eBay has a help page with valuable information regarding the steps you should take to protect yourself. Below is a link to this page:

http://pages.ebay.com/securitycenter/index.html

Tell your friends about it and publish your experience as much as possible. This will help disseminate valued information and, more importantly, always make others aware of this ongoing threat in cyberspace. This scam has been as old as the internet itself but many are still being victimized because of complacency. The email scam syndicates will never stop as long there are "willing" victims out there.

Please be reminded that this scam does not only happen to PayPal clients. eBay, bank clients (especially those involved in online transactions) and credit card holders are also a prime target. But let us always remember that awareness is the key to fight this. Rina has learned her lesson, and I hope this post will serve as a reminder to other out there to be more careful next time.