Prepare For Massive Wave of Earthquake Scams

wiredmikey sends this quote from Security Week: "Today's tragic events of the 8.9 magnitude earthquake and resulting tsunami, as sad as it is, is a dream for scammers and fraudsters around the world. Tragic events are always something scammers use to their advantage, helping them prey on and exploit innocent victims. Scams are already spreading across Facebook, which started in a matter of minutes after the news broke of the earthquake in Japan. As I write this, scammers are hard at work, registering new domains and cranking out templates for their fake donation sites. This will be followed with massive volumes of email spam, Tweets through Twitter, and Facebook posts, as scammers gear up to solicit donations from around the world." As coverage of the earthquake and resulting tsunami has proceeded, collections of videos and pictures are showing the extent of the devastation. The NY Times makes the excellent point that things could have been much worse if not for building codes and quake-resistant engineering. A state of emergency was declared at one of Japan's nuclear plants, after the earthquake caused cooling problems at one of the reactors. No radiation leakage has been reported, and the US Air Force has helped by delivering coolant by air.

Disgusting

[Anonymous Coward]

The fact that people would take advantage of the disaster and misery at the cost of thousands of people just disgusts me. It happened with Katrina, it happened with Haiti, and I guess they're gearing up for this disaster. You fuckers, I hope you rot in hell.

Re:Disgusting

[0racle]

No. The Red Cross actually suggests that you donate often to keep their accounts ready to deal with a disaster at a moments notice instead of them having to wait for donations. So it's possible that money they received because of a flood of donations after, for instance, the earthquake in Haiti is being funneled into relief destined for Japan right now.

Re:THIS is why we pay so much for our Military!

[camperdave]

The military has always been used for things other than killing people and breaking things up. Who do you thing built the roads in the Roman Empire, or built the castles dotting Europe, or that wall thingy in China. Even in our times, the Army corps of Engineers is constantly being called upon to drain swamps, dredge canals, or put up bridges.