Travel chaos revives email hacking scams

Fraudsters have been quick to take advantage of the delays and flight cancellations caused by bad weather in Europe to launch email scams.

RCMP Sgt. Paul Proulx said hackers posing as stranded travellers are sending out urgent messages asking for money.

The spokesman for theCanadian Anti-Fraud Centre calls it an old scam with a timely twist.

"Because of what's happening in the U.K., a lot of people are taking advantage of that," said Proulx. "The hacker is one of those people."

He said the scammers hack in to the victim's email account and send out urgent messages to everyone in their contact list "pleading for money and usually citing a personal emergency. So it creates a bit of a panic."

Friends fooled

On Tuesday, Graham Withers said, he woke up to a desperate-sounding email from his friend Krista Muir a Montreal musician who was claiming to be stranded in London, England.

"My bag got stolen. I'm stuck at the airport. I've got no visa, no passport. Could you just help me out for a little bit? I'll pay you back as soon as I get home," said Withers, quoting from the message.

Hesaid that it never occurred to him the email might be a scam. "You know about the weather in London. Everything is all backed up. Krista is a musician, maybe she's travelling," he said.

"I wrote back and said 'Hey, that's terrible! What do you need?'" He got a response asking for $2,000 and a request he transfer the funds through Western Union.

But Muir was nowhere near Heathrow. On Tuesday she was in a university classroom in Montreal, where she quickly discovered what had happened.

"I was called in to my professor's office. He had a printout of the email. He was like 'What is this all about?'"

Muir said everyone in her contact list had received the same plea for help and thatshe herself was locked out of her Gmail account.

She said she felt like screaming, "I'm not in London! I'm totally here, at home in Montreal!'"

Fortunately,Muir said, she doesn't think any of her contacts actually sent money.

Withers contacted a mutual friend who had received the same plea for help. That friend quickly established it was a scam by Googling the London telephone number the message said to use as a contact.

Withers said the number was linked to a number of recent scams.

Sgt. Proulx said people can better protect themselves against hackers by changing their password often.

If their account is hacked, they should get in touch with local police as well as the RCMP's Anti-Fraud Centre, he said.And anyone receiving pleas for money should always contact the person requesting help directly, and never wire money to a third party.