Anatomy of a Scam
Last Friday I got a call, supposedly from Publisher's Clearing House. Supposedly from Todd Floane at 516 543-6151. I googled him and he is a legit member of the Prize Patrol, but scammers use his name. I was the grand winner of $7.5 million and a Mercedes car! I thought it a scam, but decided to play along. They were going to deliver it all to me on Saturday, but I was away videoing at Rock to Bach all day. So we postponed things until Monday. In the meantime, I got this email:
A pdf letter was attached to this, and is attached to this post.
So, how to tell whether this is legit? First I looked at the email header:from webmail-out.titan.email (unknown [10.10.168.85]) (using TLSv1.2 with cipher ECDHE-RSA-AES256-GCM-SHA384 (256/256 bits)) (No client certificate requested) by smtp-out.flockmail.com (Postfix) with ESMTPSA id 835E71400C2 for <jamesrome@gmail.com>; Fri, 21 Feb 2025 21:53:58 +0000 (UTC)
NOT from PCH.
Then I looked up pch-award.net on whois.com . It is a parked domain belonging to namesilo.com.
pch-award.net
Updated 2 days ago
Domain Information
Domain: pch-award.net
Registered On: 2024-11-26
Expires On: 2025-11-26
Updated On: 2024-11-26
Status: client transfer prohibited
Name Servers:
ns1.dnsowl.com
ns2.dnsowl.com
ns3.dnsowl.com
ns2.dnsowl.com
ns3.dnsowl.com
Registrar Information
Registrar: NameSilo, LLC
IANA ID: 1479
Abuse Email: abuse@namesilo.com
Abuse Phone: +1.4805240066
This is quite suspicious since it should link to pch.com somehow. I also sent an email to the above address and got no response.
Today I got a call chiding me for not calling back. The car and check and all documents were in Knoxville awaiting delivery. But I had to register properly for the award. In addition to two forms of identification, I needed a $500 Amazon gift card. Note that the attached letter says that PCH pays all charges. He said that it needed to be paid for in cash, so he stayed on my cell while I drove to the ATM, and then Walgreens to but the card. BUT I REFUSED TO GIVE HIM THE CARD NUMBER.
I asked why they needed the card and he said it was for their system, But the card was purchased anonymously, and was only good for Amazon purchases. Note that Walgreens gave me a scam warning. I agreed to send him a picture of the card with the number blanked out.
He got mad that I covered up the numbers. (I did not realize at the time that the actual card was inside the right-hand cardboard, so perhaps these numbers did not matter.)
I asked him for pictures of the prizes:
Note that my name and the amount are perfectly horizontal, whereas the check is not. Todd claimed that it was him on the left. He also sen a picture of a Mercedes, but it was silver, not red as he specified.
He said that he was staying at the downtown Marriott in Knoxville, but when I said I would call him there, he said it was impossible due to security. Hah!
I then Googled "PCH prizes"and found that the biggest one available was for $1.5 million. I also found out that PCH NEVER notifies winners in advance. So I was sure this was a scam and credited the gift card to my Amazon account.
In a last gasp effort, we had the following phone conversation. He is Speaker 1. I am Speaker 2.
[Speaker 2]
Why do you need the Amazon card? It was anonymous.
[Speaker 1]
For verification.
[Speaker 2]
You can take any old number in the world.
There's no reason to use that number.
Yeah, I mean the number on the Amazon gift card only has use on Amazon. They have no government payment system. They all can only give you five hundred dollars of merchandise.
[Speaker 1]
The card is used to register your package all, right?
[Speaker 2]
Well, you, you can have the number now because I credited it to my account.
[Speaker 1]
We are an organization that is fully ensured by Geico, so you don't have to worry yourself, sir.
Are well protected.
[Speaker 2]
Well, since I redeemed the card, the number's still there, you can use it. I'll give it to you.
Since, since you're not going to redeem it for anything that's fine.
[Speaker 1]
No, but once they check it with Amazon, if the money is not available on the card, they're not going to complete the process because....
[Speaker 2]
That that Amazon can do that has anything to do with verifying identities or paying government fees or anything else.
For verification.
[Speaker 2]
You can take any old number in the world.
There's no reason to use that number.
Yeah, I mean the number on the Amazon gift card only has use on Amazon. They have no government payment system. They all can only give you five hundred dollars of merchandise.
[Speaker 1]
The card is used to register your package all, right?
[Speaker 2]
Well, you, you can have the number now because I credited it to my account.
[Speaker 1]
We are an organization that is fully ensured by Geico, so you don't have to worry yourself, sir.
Are well protected.
[Speaker 2]
Well, since I redeemed the card, the number's still there, you can use it. I'll give it to you.
Since, since you're not going to redeem it for anything that's fine.
[Speaker 1]
No, but once they check it with Amazon, if the money is not available on the card, they're not going to complete the process because....
[Speaker 2]
That that Amazon can do that has anything to do with verifying identities or paying government fees or anything else.
[Speaker 1]
So? This is, you have never done this before. I Don't understand why have you ever bought an Amazon card and lose your money before?
So? This is, you have never done this before. I Don't understand why have you ever bought an Amazon card and lose your money before?
[Speaker 2]
Yes.
[Speaker 3]
Okay. All right.
[Speaker 1]
And since we're not gonna be able to complete even this process today, what I'm gonna ask you? Do you have any information that you would like to send down to the fraud department?
[Speaker 2]
Whose fraud department?
I looked,it up.
Publishers Clearing House does not have a seven and a half million dollar award. Their biggest one is one and a half. It's going to be given out in February 28th. I also looked up.
[Speaker 1]
I'm telling you. That's what I'm trying to tell you, but you're not believing me.
[Speaker 2]
They would advertise if they were giving out seven and a half million dollars because it would be to their benefit. No, no, they wouldn't do it like that. And furthermore, I did not enter with my sweepstakes. So goodbye, I will give up the seven and a half million and stop bothering me.
[Speaker 3]
Okay. All right.
[Speaker 1]
And since we're not gonna be able to complete even this process today, what I'm gonna ask you? Do you have any information that you would like to send down to the fraud department?
[Speaker 2]
Whose fraud department?
I looked,it up.
Publishers Clearing House does not have a seven and a half million dollar award. Their biggest one is one and a half. It's going to be given out in February 28th. I also looked up.
[Speaker 1]
I'm telling you. That's what I'm trying to tell you, but you're not believing me.
[Speaker 2]
They would advertise if they were giving out seven and a half million dollars because it would be to their benefit. No, no, they wouldn't do it like that. And furthermore, I did not enter with my sweepstakes. So goodbye, I will give up the seven and a half million and stop bothering me.