International Mobile Promo: Beware of SMS Scams!

Internet is not a very safe place and you got to be very careful when it comes to leaving your details around. It is sad that people use internet, such a good thing to happen to human beings after invention of wheels I would say, for many things criminal. I have come to a point where I am thinking of deleting all my accounts from whatever sites I am using while I surf net.

Now, what is making me write this?

Every other day I receive one or two emails that declare me a winner of some fabulous lucky-dip that I never participated in. The moment I read 'lottery' or 'prize' on the subject line of an email, I know now that it is spam.I never even bother to read it. And I report it. So far spamming was restricted to emails. Now, it is all over the place. The other day I received this SMS from MO GCNPROMO.

CONGRAT! Your mobile number have won 425,000 GBP in WCN International Mobile Promo. For claim contact WCN @ Tel: +447014248947 & Email:-cellsglo@live.com

I'm sure spammers got my number as I was trying to use one of these net call facilities on Internet. I have tried four or five of them who offer "Computer to Phone" call facility. And I'm sure it's one of them who gave my number away. Either they sold it to a couple of Internet Thugs or they themselves did it. I accept I should have thought before I gave away my number to a site about whom I have no idea. But that's the way it is on internet and I can't really blame anybody.

I tried to see if there are people who got the similar messages. Google took me to a site that allowed people to record their complaints and what you see below is a snapshot of similar complaints registered on this site.

I am so excited about ways in which technology can be used for the good of the people. And I am so disgusted about how people can turn it around and use it for bad things. And I decide, I'll strictly adhere to the following in the future that these kind of people are not encouraged:

• I'll not open or reply to any email that I think is spam and I'll report spam to the email service provider that I use.
• I'll report an email spam if it is from a sender I don't know
• I'll never give my email id to any of the sites that I don't trust. My trust is based on word of mouth. 
• I'll never register my mobile number or email id with any of the newsletters that are around.
• I'll never give my email id or password to any of the social community networks that asks me for such details to fetch my contact list
• I'll report spam when ever I get them on the Chat Software Packages I use.
• I'll never use any other software other than the software made available by the site whose chat  facility I am using. For example, I'll never access Google Talk or Yahoo! Messenger from any other site or software
• I'll never visit porn sites that may send malicious code to my computer
• I'll not use a software just because it is free. I'll double check it to see if the author can be trusted before I use it.
• I'll change my passwords, at least once a month
• I'll not use all the applications and widgets, just because they are on a site I trust because I know people collaborate with the sites to make them. 

I hope this way I'll be able to prevent spam to some extend. I really hope so!