Title: Spam/Chain letters/Email fraud

$Revision: 1.2 $ $Date: 2001/10/23 00:10:30 $ $Author: dittrich $

Q: I have received the following email message, which I think is
illegal.  Am I supposed to report it to you?  What should I do
about it?

A: There are three common types of unsolicited commercial email
that are received by UW faculty/staff/students, which may
be illegal in nature.  These are:

1).  Common "spam" advertising some company, product, or service
that is not affiliated with the UW in any way.

Washington State has an "anti-spam" law, known as the "Unsolicited
Commercial Electronic Mail Act," (RCW 19.190.020).  Enforcement
of this act is handled by the office of the Washington State
Attorney General, who has a spam complaint reporting web site
that you can use:

	http://www.wa.gov/AGO/junkemail/


2).  Chain letters soliciting money or purchases of "reports"
on how to get rich quick by mass-emailing.

These are the jurisdiction of the Federal Trade Commission,
which has a web site for filing complaints:

	https://rn.ftc.gov/dod/wsolcq$.startup?Z_ORG_CODE=PU01

Note that chain letters fall under the category "Multi-level
marketing".

See also:

	http://www.ftc.gov/bcp/conline/pubs/alerts/doznalrt.htm


3).  Letters soliciting assistance in moving large sums of
money from another country, donations to charity, providing
assistance in collection of money owed by the government
or prize winnings, requiring your bank account number
or credit card number to get money to you.

These are fraud, which falls under the jurisdiction of
the FBI.  The FBI has an online Internet Fraud
Complaint Center you can use to report these:

	http://www.fbi.gov/hq/cid/fc/ifcc/ifcc.htm



You can also recognize which letters are already known to be
circulating, or verify the claims made by someone posing as a charity,
by checking web sites that archive scams, frauds, and email hoaxes.

Other references:

	http://www.fraud.org/
	http://people.delphi.com/lfirrantello/nospam/reportspam_represources.html
	http://hoaxbusters.ciac.org
	http://www.vmyths.com/