Fraudsters use royal seal in bitcoin mail scam
CROOKS are trying it on with begging letters “from the Queen” that say she needs to borrow £19billion for Brexit.
The letters, claiming to be from a senior aide of Her Majesty, are even marked with a fake royal seal.
And they promise anyone who “lends” money will get 30 per cent interest.
In exchange for keeping the economy on an even keel amid Brexit chaos, donors are told they will get a Royal Warrant – a prized mark of excellence in trade and industry.
The poorly spelled letter asks donors to send cash via the bitcoin electronic currency. It said: “We will offer 30% interest for a period of 3 months and a possibility to become a Member of the Royal Warrant Holders Assiciation [sic]”.
It said paying the cash to the European Union means the economy will be kept intact and inflation will not rise or fall for a minimum period of ten years.
It added: “We want this letter to remain anonymous as we do not wish the subject to go viral. This could affect the agreements we have in order to obtain the bilateral agreement.”
A bitcoin address is provided, asking for transfer of funds before another letter with a “contract” will be sent. The scam letter was received by Paul Ridden, CEO at Smarttask, a UK tech firm. He suspects the tricksters opted to print it on paper because the public have become vigilant against email scams asking for huge donations to foreign royalty.
He said: “We get quite a lot of attempts where people pretend to be a supplier or me or my financial director.
“They’ll pretend to be my head of accounts. They’ll attempt by email or telephone call to try to manipulate the accounts team to pay money.
“That’s a thing we face daily, defending the business from those kind of social engineering attacks.
“But this is the first time we’ve had one printed on paper and requesting bitcoin.”
He said: “When I posted i t online I assumed sooner or later somebody would say ‘I’ve got one too.’ There’s nobody else who’s had one, so maybe it’s a bit more local. When you think it’s in an envelope with a stamp on, somebody’s had to pay for that.”
After revealing the first class stamp on the envelope wasn’t franked he said: “It’d be ironic if I’m getting free postage out of it.” Sales consultant Martin Leich raised a chuckle by feigning concern and saying Mr Ridden should not have exposed t he Queen to embarrassment.
Mr Leich joked: “Why are you posting this online? It clearly states private and confidential.
“What if the EU hears about this? You’re risking the bilateral agreement. I don’t know what Boris is going to do when he
finds out.”