Bank on it

About a month or so ago, I was purging my mailbox of all my spam emails for the day.

There were quite a few. Click, click, click, whoosh...

Then I came across one from Chase that sounded pretty official, warning me that it looked like some unusual activity had been detected in my online statement.

Uh oh. I hate when that happens. It usually means passwords need to be changed. Phone calls need to be made. Anxiety needs to be abated. I'm not a computer nerd. When anything out of the ordinary shows up, like spinning beach balls or popup alerts, I start to sweat (see my recent 'No sweat' blog).

I wondered what I should do.

Then it occurred to me: I don't have an account with Chase. What the heck? How can there be unusual activity in an account that I don't have?

Click. Whoosh.

A few days later, I got an email from Wells Fargo, warning me that there had been some unusual activity detected in my online account.

Uh oh. How did that hap... Oh, wait a minute. I don't have an account with Wells Fargo. What the heck?

Click. Whoosh.

 A few days later, I received another email from yet another financial corporation. As soon as I read "Unusual activity," I hit click. Whoosh.

All through this, I'm pretty sure none of these emails had corresponding corporation logos on them. Not that a logo on the email would be a qualifier for me, but it does send something of a shiver through you if you think your finances have been tampered with.

Getting all these emails reminds of the good ol' days when I used to get emails from third world royalty, telling me that I qualified for massive sums of money from their dead uncle if only I would make contact with them.

Click. Whoosh.

Even this morning, I got an email from an address that read "stergios3," claiming he was a physician in Sydney, Australia, and he was looking for nurses, doctors, laboratory managers, engineers, etc, willing to relocate for the duration of a three-year contract.

Not sure how the scam works on this one, but, c'mon. Do your due diligence, buddy. I don't even speak Australian.

And then there's this: Lately I've gotten phone calls on my land line from somebody that is using my phone number to call me. Huh? I know this because of the caller ID feature I have that tells me I'm calling myself. I'm pretty sure that I'm not so bored that I have to call myself for entertainment.

Kim, out of curiosity, answered one of those calls, and she got a recorded message that suggested our licensing with Microsoft had expired.

We don't use Microsoft.

Hang up. Bzzzzzz.