Spam

The first message came three weeks back, on a busy Monday. The subject was “URGENT”. The sender’s address seemed to be that of an old schoolteacher.  I could not be sure because I had not saved our e-mail correspondence.  The main message was, ‘…in Bangkok. Last night, I was attacked. I suffered minor injuries and lost my money, bag and other possessions. I urgently need fifty thousand rupees. Kindly help me by sending the money via bank transfer to…’ It sounded so believable. But, what was my old schoolteacher doing in Bangkok? And, he would have called me and not e-mailed. I have heard of spam where hackers adopt identities from e-mail correspondence.

I had nearly forgotten that message when I got the second nine days back, on a Saturday. The subject was the same. The sender’s name and address matched that of my ex-wife. Once again, ‘…raped… hostage… in Vancouver…’ The give-away was the last line, the same barring the account details. Anyway, she is in California, I think, not Canada. Who gets raped in Vancouver?

The third, I got last night. The gist was the same. The sender was an old girlfriend. It was weird getting an e-mail from her. I knew her when there were no e-mails. The last time we were together, I was drunk and had no business driving. I thought she was dead and I barely managed to escape from that crash site without being noticed.