Well, Angelina Jolie is very keen to have me as a friend on Facebook. It’s a pity I am not on Facebook, as she has invited me to be her friend nine times in two days. It’s almost as if she wants it too much. If she keeps this up, sending me constant invites, I might start wondering if she’s maybe a bit needy. I mean, it’s definitely her – look at the picture! Unless … I don’t know … it’s some kind of unsolicited email sent randomly and en masse with various clickable links that might be used to confirm a recipient’s email address should they guilelessly click on them.
I am, as you know, fascinated by spam. I have written about it before. I plough through my spam filter every day, in order to rescue genuine emails that might have slipped through and been caught there in the gauze, and as I merrily delete it, I can’t help but enjoy identifying the trends in subject headings. Some of them are evergreens: the ones that just come right out with it and mention Viagra and Rolex and penis enlargement pills – and of course the Canadian pharmacy never goes away. But I like the ones that suddenly start to crop up in spurts, like, currently, the one that purports to be from Twitter and urges you to click on a link to either rescue your password or read some unread messages, or the Outlook Setup Notification, or the Angelina Jolie invitation.
I love the made-up names that appear to try and hoodwink you into thinking the email is from a long-lost friend – recent examples: Jesus Chastity, Sandy Sandoval, Leslie Gala, Kyle Yadira – and the matey subject lines like, “Hello” and “Usual thing” and “Hi!” and “Hello from Russia!”
I truly wonder who would fall for these obviously unscrupulous ruses, but then again, I understand the maths, and it only takes one hapless fool to respond or click and the relatively low-cost operation can be deemed a success. I have clicked on the Angelina Jolie one and await her reply.
Never Knowingly Underwhelmed 