Here was the email:
Hi Bob,
It may be hard to believe, but people regularly forget about deposits, property they owned or overlook funds that they should have inherited. This actually happens more often than you might think. In fact, there are billions of dollars in unclaimed assets in locations throughout the United States. We performed a simple search on your email address ([email protected]), and quickly discovered that you have unclaimed assets. Please take a closer look by following the link below and hopefully you can regain control of your missing valuable property that is rightfully yours.
Reclaim Your Money Now
Thank you!
This looked tempting. After all, I did collect quite a bit of unclaimed property recently and wrote about it in this column. But this looked fishy. All they had was my email address (pretty easy to get), and if I clicked on the blue link, I’m pretty sure they would have asked for my full name, address, birthday, Social Security Number, etc. Maybe my bank account routing number so they could transfer funds to me. (Ha! Fat chance!) I don’t know this for sure because I never clicked.
I “woke up” before I clicked on the link and deleted the email. No harm done. If I had additional unclaimed property coming (and I’ve checked in every state where I have ever lived), it wouldn’t be under my email address. It would be under my legal name (which, as you probably know, isn’t Bob Dancer.)
We’re all used to appeals from the exiled prince in Nigeria or wherever, but this was a new one. At least to me.
They say it’s easier to cheat a greedy person. And the promise of “free money” can certainly increase one’s greed momentarily. After all, who would want to miss out on money that is rightfully theirs?
I may have missed out on a windfall here, but I’ll take that chance. I more likely avoided an identity theft problem — which is the far greater concern to me.
Most people, I assume, upon reflection will agree that this is probably a scam. And properly avoid it by deleting it. But it’s easier to avoid if you’ve heard about it beforehand. Which is why I’m posting this.
