Seems P.T. Barnum was right: there’s one born every minute — sucker, that is.
The latest evidence comes from a PC World newsletter article, “Holiday Online Shopping Trends Emerge,” in which we learn the benign news that consumers swarmed to the Internet in large numbers in November and December, boosting sellers’ revenues to as much as $15.5 billion for the two-month period by one estimate.
But here’s the shocker:
“While many online shoppers are getting savvier, others are still too naive or ignorant of online dangers and engaging in risky and questionable buying practices. For example, a surprising 21 percent of respondents to a survey conducted in November by the Business Software Alliance and the Council of Better Business Bureaus admitted to having purchased software from a spammer. The same survey found that 22 percent of respondents bought apparel and jewelry from a spammer.”
Clue time, folks. If the spammer sends you anything, count on it being: 1, laced with spyware; 2, pirated; 3, stolen; and/or 4, defective. And if you paid for your spam-marketed software with a credit card, you’ve given your card number to someone you’ve never laid eyes on who’s likely in a foreign country beyond reach of U.S. law enforcement.
Similar bad outcomes befall those who buy clothes and jewelry. Then there’s all those manhood-enlargement pills, potions and gadgets, plus a wide array of name-brand prescription drugs. If you want to do yourself in in more ways than just the financial, be sure to pick up some spam-marketed pharmaceuticals.
Know, too, that if almost no one — we’ll never get 100 percent on board — buys from spammers, there will be little incentive for them to send the stuff out. In short, stop encouraging the S.O.B.s.
