OUR PLACE
You’ve got nothing coming.
Not from Harbor Freight, not from O’Reilly’s Auto Parts, not from DeWalt tools or any of the rest of them. There is a current crop of emails going out, mostly to email addresses owned by men, that promises great Free Gifts being given for no reason whatsoever. This is a capitalistic democratic republic you are living in. Nothing’s free. There’s always a catch, even if it’s something given out to prove that some things are given out.
In Las Vegas the casinos will sometimes hold great celebrations about a million-dollar winner of a dollar slot machine. The ‘winner’ is usually an employee paid to act like a winner. That’s legal in Vegas but it does reveal how things can really work to make people believe that there are Free Gifts out there just waiting to be accepted by willing citizens. Those emails are after something. When you respond, which the GSR encourages you not to, then the concern behind the email begins collecting your personal data so the ‘gift’ can be shipped. That data is valuable to scammers, and it’s needed badly. These fraudsters pay a lot of money for the data collected when people respond to these emails and give out their addresses, social security numbers, and more, all in the name of providing the fraudsters with valid identification.
LifeLock and others like them are not going to help. Those are legal fraud organizations all of their own. They do nothing to protect your identity, nor do they pay you if you lose money because of an email scam. Don’t give out your data on the Internet. Any person or organization that wants your data, if you don’t know them, is simply looking to take your money. They depend upon you never telling anyone because you feel like such a fool for not having figured the scam out in time. There are no Free Gifts just waiting to be sent, not now and not ever. It’s simply not that kind of world.
Persons of the Week
Cathy, Diane, Jessica and Scott are all members of the Never Say Never Playground committee. This is a wonderful organization doing good for all of Walworth County.
