I sent you one of the phish email I got about a bank doing some home loan for 2%. I hope it helps.

N E Way, I'm off to help this Nigerian Finance Manager get his money into the US. I hope he is okay, I've only sent him $500 to get started. He seems like a really nice guy.

Yes! If you've been scammed, tell Ben. Tell everybody. That's the only way people like this get caught.

Be very aware right now, the scammers are feeling the tough times too, and are getting more aggressive.

When dealing with scammers, it is better to over react than under react. BTW, if you're wrong, you can always say sorry. Really not a problem.

My faaaaavorite are the phone calls from the companies who "work with over 500 banks and lenders to get you out of debt", but the moment you try to get specifics on any of their business models or practices they hang up.

We just got a settlement check from the whole AmeriDebt fiasco. I think you need to write a PSA for Consumer Credit Counseling Services. If my husband had gone through them first, he might have been able to avoid bankruptcy.

Dangit, I just cleaned out my spam folder and there were definitely a few scam E-mails in there about the banking crisis.

I am sure I will get more.

We've had our current landline phone number for 9+ years--- and we're getting four-five calls a week from collection agencies looking for someone that had the number previously.

They just don't take no for an answer.

While we're on a similar subject, where can one go to complain about a debt collector's tactics? Two years ago one called my office, pressed zero for an operator, asked for my supervisor's extension and told her that if I didn't call they were going to garnish my wages. I was in a bad place two years ago, the debt is now paid but I would like to be able to point these guys out somewhere.

Check with local law enforcement - they can give you plenty of very sad stories.

Have you heard of the "Federal Land Patent" scam? My wife's uncle got scammed by some guy who told them they could stop paying their mortgage and keep their house by filing some forms and putting a sign up on their property. Of course, HE was the only one that knows how to do this, and he could help you if you give him $5K. Oh.. that's just to get the paperwork started and the "seminar", it will be another $3K to actually fill it out, then another $5K to file it and so on and so on, until the sheriff comes to evict you. There's more info here: [www.10news.com] Hope it helps.

I've been seeing the IRS stimulus payment phishing scams for months...

I've also been getting a call about 4 times a day from some company that won't identify themselves, they just immediately ask me for my credit card number, saying that they have important business that they need to tell me about.

I got the FBI phishing one this morning. Of course the FBI doesn't have an email address (that I can find) to forward the email to, they want you to actually fill out a case. Yeah. with 5 minutes to leave for work, that is just not going to happen.

@graceless: Hey, if you're wrong, they're DOING something wrong. Legitimate businesses that conduct themselves like scammers need a crash course in common sense. God, I love alliteration.