Spam Gallery–United Postal Service Tracking

The Spam Gallery is a series of posts that give examples of spam messages, explaining telltales signs of how they are spam.

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After all my posts about emails simply looking suspicious, then comes one that is all wrapped up in someone else’s template.  Let’s look at what they did right:

  • They used a complete template from a UPS email, which makes it look authentic.
  • They left most of the links in the email untouched, so if you clicked the UPS logo, you would go to the UPS home page.  The only malicious link is the “Track your Shipment now!” link
  • They included the first part of my email address in their greeting for personalization.

But they still got plenty wrong, including:

  • The FROM address is from my email, except using @gmail.com,  not from ups.com.
  • The subject line uses the name “United Postal Service”, not “United Parcel Service”.  Things get weirder in the email footer, where “United Parcel Service” is used, but references are also made to “USPS.com” and “USPS Team”.
  • They use the phrase “With Respect To You”.  Foreign spammers must think American companies are very personal and proper.  They are not.

When you receive an email like this, ask yourself: how did they get my email address?