Scammers are certainly not short on creativity. With new scams coming out so frequently, this should probably be a weekly article. I’m not sure we have time for that, but we’ll think about it.
Here’s a new scam going around right now that business owners with a website should be aware of. Falling for this trap could infect your computer with a virus costing you money and time. We did not take the bait, so we can’t be certain what the endgame is, but likely it’s just a virus. It’s also possible that they might try to convince you to pay them to go away.
The Copied Images Scam
A new scam making its way around the internet comes as an email that is addressed to one of your company email addresses, or they may use your website’s contact form if no email address is listed on your website.
The message is purportedly from an owner of a digital property, likely an image or photo. The message will claim that you are illegally using one or more of his photos on your website. The trick is to shock you with threats of legal action to be taken, and already taken. He is so ‘disturbed’ by your lack of ethics, having stolen his property for your own use. The ‘shock and awe’ tactic is employed to persuade you to click the link to resolve the issue before you start using some common sense. Here is a sample letter…
Hello,
This is Melanie and I am a licensed photographer.
I was surprised, frankly speaking, when I saw my images at your web-site. If you use a copyrighted image without an owner’s permission, you need to be aware that you could be sued by the copyright owner.
It’s not legal to use stolen images and it’s so selfish!
Take a look at this document with the links to my images you used at <yourdomain.com> and my earlier publications to obtain the evidence of my copyrights.
Download it now and check this out for yourself: <google drive download link>
If you don’t remove the images mentioned in the document above within the next several days, I’ll file a to your hosting provider stating that my copyrights have been severely infringed and I am trying to protect my intellectual property. And if it is not enough, trust me I am going to take legal action against you! And you won’t receive the second notice from me.
The tactic seems to be working temporarily, because most website owners have no idea where the images on their site come from. And they don’t want to be sued for something that seems almost plausible.
But let’s get real. Why must you click a link to a Google drive download in order to see what images you supposedly copied? If they spent so much time to compile a document and save it to a shared drive, seems they could have at least mentioned which page of your site contains the suspect images.
We don’t have time to play cat and mouse with hackers, or I would respond to the email just to see what happens next. The email conversations often make for a great story to tell your buddies. So just ignore the message, or if you want to be certain, you can forward it to your website designer. Just don’t click on the link.