| Pages in topic: [1 2] > | Yet another scam sent via Proz Thread poster: Kevin Fulton
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Kevin Fulton 
United States
Local time: 16:46
German to English
Received this. The profile shows UK, but the IP is Jordan. The text bears all the hallmarks of a scam: poor English, funky punctuation:
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You have been sent a message via ProZ.com.
Author: Axxx (ProZ.com Member)
Author's Profile: http://www.proz.com/profile/1735534
Author's IP address: 94.142.39.246
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Dear Kevin,
I'm Xxx... See more Received this. The profile shows UK, but the IP is Jordan. The text bears all the hallmarks of a scam: poor English, funky punctuation:
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You have been sent a message via ProZ.com.
Author: Axxx (ProZ.com Member)
Author's Profile: http://www.proz.com/profile/1735534
Author's IP address: 94.142.39.246
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Dear Kevin,
I'm Xxxx Xxxx, experienced German To English translator
specializes in technical,medical and legal fields .I have been working as a freelance
translator since 2004, and now i'm working with a direct client which makes the process quick
and straightforward . In this way the client decreases the translation expenses and
receives high quality translations. As a response to his growing translation needs, the client
decided to expand the team with experienced freelance translators .
Most of the translations is not time critical and it's
volume ranges between 500 - 5000 words,however, you can take any translation if you are
available at that time. If you are interested to join us please contact me ASAP, so I can tell
the client and you will work with him directly. Please note that the client is one of the
Fortune 500 companies .
Thank you for your time .
Best Regards,
Xxxx
[Edited at 2013-03-17 17:01 GMT]
[Edited at 2013-03-17 17:02 GMT] ▲ Collapse
| | | | Steven Segaert
Estonia
Local time: 23:46
Member (2012)
English to Dutch
+ ...
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cancelled
[Edited at 2013-03-18 07:30 GMT]
| | | | Natalie
Poland
Local time: 22:46
Member (2002)
English to Russian
+ ...
MODERATOR SITE LOCALIZER | Exactly, and there is NO such name listed | Mar 17, 2013 |
Steven Segaert wrote:
It gives me hope that for me too, ATA certification is within reach
It is quite easy to check that there is no such translator listed in the ATA directory.
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Inge Meinzer
United States
Local time: 13:46
German to English
+ ...
| Got the same message and thought it was fishy | Mar 17, 2013 |
I thought it was odd that he states he is acting on behalf of a direct client. However, upon checking the subject line of his email I found "German > English translators needed / direct client / HQ translation". I checked "HQ translation" on Google and found "High Quality Translations", an LSP website with US phone and fax numbers on their contact page. I am inclined to side with Kevin on this. The writer's English is not as poor as in your "normal" scams, but it is poor enough to make me doubt ... See more I thought it was odd that he states he is acting on behalf of a direct client. However, upon checking the subject line of his email I found "German > English translators needed / direct client / HQ translation". I checked "HQ translation" on Google and found "High Quality Translations", an LSP website with US phone and fax numbers on their contact page. I am inclined to side with Kevin on this. The writer's English is not as poor as in your "normal" scams, but it is poor enough to make me doubt his ability to make his living with translations into English. I also checked the ATA website and found no member by that name. I do not need any other evidence... ▲ Collapse
| | | | Kevin Fulton
United States
Local time: 16:46
German to English
TOPIC STARTER | Not a native speaker as claimed | Mar 17, 2013 |
Angie Garbarino wrote:
This profile is verified paying member, maybe doesn't know a perfect English, but to me he is not a scammer...
Quite simply, the quality of the language of that e-mail is not that of a native speaker of English and graduate of a UK university. The punctuation is that of the typical scam -- it is intended to catch the unwary who might ignore such subtleties. A short-term membership in Proz is not very expensive compared to the potential gain of harvesting CVs from professional translators in order to obtain work under false pretenses.
| | | | | Post removed: This post was hidden by a moderator or staff member for the following reason: Post edited empty by the poster | David Wright
Austria
Local time: 22:46
German to English
+ ...
| Got the same message | Mar 17, 2013 |
he's registered, but only since March 13., there is no hit for a translator of this name in Google, he uses gmail - if it looks like .... it probably is.
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Woodstock (X)
Germany
Local time: 22:46
German to English
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| Not verified | Mar 17, 2013 |
Angie Garbarino wrote:
This profile is verified paying member, maybe doesn't know a perfect English, but to me he is not a scammer...
Verified members have a black check mark by their names. Someone said in another thread a few months ago that there are also scammers now who pay to become members. I guess ripping off translators has become lucrative enough to pay the ProZ membership fee. Very sad state of affairs.
There are a couple of troubling signs, which I won't elaborate on to help other aspiring scammers, but if you re-read his message and look for them, they should be obvious. This is definitely one to watch and be wary of.
Edited to add: Suspected scams can and should be reported to the freemail company these criminals are using. They care about their image and are big enough to take action. I reported a recent scam/email to MS/hotmail, which the scammer was using, and they responded asking for more information, which I provided. If we all did this, it might help to stem the tide over the long term.
Link to reporting spam/scam: http://spamlinks.net/track-report-addresses.htm
Forward the email with header information to the appropriate address.
[Edited at 2013-03-17 18:53 GMT]
| | | | Oliver Walter
United Kingdom
Local time: 21:46
German to English
+ ...
| I received it also | Mar 17, 2013 |
I received the same message (but "Dear Oliver", not "Dear Kevin", of course), logged in to ProZ to see whether anybody else had received it and was also suspicious, and found this thread.
As Kevin says, the Author's IP address: 94.142.39.246
is in Jordan (I used http://en.utrace.de/ to discover this).
Two of the obvious errors of English are contained in:
"Most of the translatio... See more I received the same message (but "Dear Oliver", not "Dear Kevin", of course), logged in to ProZ to see whether anybody else had received it and was also suspicious, and found this thread.
As Kevin says, the Author's IP address: 94.142.39.246
is in Jordan (I used http://en.utrace.de/ to discover this).
Two of the obvious errors of English are contained in:
"Most of the translations is not time critical and it's volume ranges ...".
I suppose "decreases the translation expenses" is supposed to mean "reduces his translation costs".
A gmail address for the email sender, no company name, no postal address, no telephone number: all this, combined with the poor English quality (of a claimed experienced translator into English) and the apparent nature of the work offered, leads me to...
My conclusion: I shall not reply.
Oliver
[Edited at 2013-03-17 21:12 GMT] ▲ Collapse
| | | | JaneD
Sweden
Local time: 22:46
Member (2009)
Swedish to English
+ ...
| Utterly dire English - clearly a scam | Mar 17, 2013 |
I don't think there's a sentence in the whole thing that hasn't got at least several errors. Perhaps he wrote his language pair backwards by mistake?!
| | | | Oliver Walter
United Kingdom
Local time: 21:46
German to English
+ ...
| Not that mistake | Mar 17, 2013 |
JaneD wrote:
Perhaps he wrote his language pair backwards by mistake?! I think it's more likely he simply thinks his English is good enough to write emails like this, but to us it clearly is not.
Oliver
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Trudy Peters
United States
Local time: 16:46
German to English
+ ...
| Got the same message yesterday... | Mar 17, 2013 |
and deleted it. Newly registered at ProZ and no trace of him in the ATA directory.
I wonder why he's so eager to put translators in direct contact with the end client? Does he get a finder's fee or does he have other, unsavory motives?
| | | | Kevin Fulton
United States
Local time: 16:46
German to English
TOPIC STARTER | Potentially reputation-damaging | Mar 17, 2013 |
Trudy Peters wrote:
does he have other, unsavory motives?
Without going into detail. the net effect is that someone fraudulently obtains work under another identity. You've seen the quality of his English. Although I'm sure scammers have already figured out how to carry this out, I'm not going to describe the process in detail here. Besides, I may want to try it myself.
| | | | Rowan Morrell
New Zealand
Local time: 08:46
Member (2003)
French to English
+ ...
| Got this message as well | Mar 17, 2013 |
As with others, there were several "red flags" for me, in particular the Gmail address, poor grammar and newly-registered profile. The whole thing just didn't "smell right". And now that I've seen this thread, I'm in absolutely no doubt at all.
By the way, I reported the e-mail, and got a message saying he's been blocked and currently under investigation by ProZ staff. So that's really good news.
[Edited at 2013-03-18 11:37 GMT]
| | | | | Pages in topic: [1 2] > | To report site rules violations or get help, contact a site moderator: You can also contact site staff by submitting a support request » Yet another scam sent via Proz | CafeTran Espresso | You've never met a CAT tool this clever!
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