Bark SPAM

What is Bark?

“Bark is a lead generation service. ”

By that, I think they mean business based on unsolicited email.

“Customers tell us what they’re looking for and we put them in touch with local service providers to help get the job done.”

So they send a ton of emails for the same lead to a harvested email list.

“We usually charge a small fee for introductions and operate on a pay as you go basis but this one is completely free as we’ve approached you. It is essentially our way of introduction and your way of trying us out. We’re just hoping you give it a go and decide you would like to use us again in the future (of course that is completely up to you). There are no sign up fees, subscriptions or commissions”

Sadly they keep signing me up. Even though I’ve contacted them previously.

Today I sent them a GDPR access request in light of their email. They immediately sent me an email saying they had removed me from their database.

I replied and said I’d made an access request and I still expected a response in 30 days.

Let’s hope this makes them think twice about spamming people.

Although by the sounds of it spamming people is their business model.

PLEASE CONFIRM RECEIPT IMMEDIATELY

It’s been a while since I posted a spam message. This was great though sadly lacking in the contact number so how am I supposed to claim my money????!

Attn: Beneficiary,

I am Mr. Raymond Mureto from the Office of Inspection Unit/United Nations Agency in George Bush Intercontinental Airport Houston, Texas USA. During my recent routine check at the Airport Storage/vault on withheld packages, I discovered an abandoned shipment that belongs to you from a Diplomat from London and Africa, when scanned it revealed an undisclosed sum of money in two Metal Trunk Boxes weighing approximately 25kg each and some people are coming after this consignment to clam it in your name.

The consignment was abandoned because the Contents was not properly declared by the consignee as “MONEY” rather it was declared as personal effect to avoid interrogation and also the inability of the diplomat to pay for the INTERNATIONAL CONSIGNMENT MONEY MOVEMENT Charges Before bringing in the consignment into US and we refused to return back the consignment where it came from since, we have already received it here in USA. On my assumption, each of the box contain not less than $5.250 Million to $10.7Million and the consignment is still left in our Storage House here at the George Bush Intercontinental Airport Houston, Texas USA till date.

The details of the consignment including your name, your email address and the official document from the United Nations office in Geneva are tagged on the Metal Trunk boxes in your favor. But to enable me confirm if you are the actual recipient of this consignment, I will advise you to provide your current Phone Number and Full Address to enable me cross check if it corresponds with the address on the official documents including the Name of the nearest Airport around your city.

Please note that this consignment is supposed to have been returned to the United States Treasury Department as unclaimed delivery due to the delay in concluding the clearance processes. Therefore you are advice to respond to this message and call me immediately as you read. Once I receive your above requested information I can get everything concluded within 3 to 6 hours upon your acceptance and proceed to your address for delivery.

Below is my direct telephone number, I am always out of office for inspection, so if I am unable to pick your call you should know that I have gone for inspection just email me and make sure you include your mobile number so that I can give you a call, but for now I am expecting your call today as you read this message.

Best Regards,

Raymond Mureto
Head Officer-in-Charge
George Bush Intercontinental Airport Houston, Texas USA

Read my massage very clear!

Hello I know that you will be surprised to receive this letter from me since you don’t know me in person, Please Read my massage very clear to understand that I want you to be my mutual partner for a very good business proposal but before we continue to the business in question I will like you to know me more, I’m Rebbecca Hush, female, single and I’m presently in the USA, My parents are Cocoa merchants and exporters residing in Republic of Cote D’Ivoire but they where suddenly attacked and killed by some rebel groups during the war in CoteD’Ivoire, My Late Father made a fix deposit with one of the commercial banks in Republic of Cote D’Ivoire before his sudden death, I need your assistance to transfer this fund to your Country for investment, I will give you more details about me and the amount involve in my next email, I’m looking forward to your reply Regards Rebbecca

You’re not anonymous. I know your name, email, and company.

Another example of why just because you can doesn’t mean you should. Privacy advocates are already looking to strangle the ad industry. This just adds fuel to the fire. Users don’t even know they need to opt-out of this kind of tracking which leads to media stories and then people blocking all tracking technologies even the benign ones which fund the web.

For example, if [a visitor] went to XYZ.com and filled out a web form and then [the visitor] later visited 42floors.com, [42Floors] would be able to identify [the visitor] by name/email as well as company details even though [the visitor] never filled out a web form on [42Floors.com].

via You’re not anonymous. I know your name, email, and company..

Data cops: Facebook privacy plans must be ‘modified’ • The Register

Facebook remains tied to a Federal Trade Commission (FTC) settlement that “prohibits the company from changing privacy settings without the affirmative consent of users or misrepresenting the privacy or security of users’ personal information”.

Indeed, as of November 2011, Facebook agreed to bi-annual privacy audits for two decades as part of its deal with the FTC. At the time the US watchdog said Facebook must be clear about changes to its website, including providing a “prominent notice” to users.

The social network was told it should obtain “express consent” before a user’s information is shared beyond any privacy settings already established by an individual connected to Facebook.

Arguably then, Facebook is failing to honour at least part of its agreement with the FTC: the website did inform all of its users of the plans in an email outlining the proposed tweaks. But it may have fallen down on the requirement to seek “express consent” for sharing data beyond the limits set in place by users. That said, the stateside regulator is yet to publicly express any disquiet about the company’s incoming privacy policy overhaul.

In contrast, here in Europe, the office of Ireland’s Data Protection Commissioner confirmed late last week that it was seeking “urgent clarification” from Facebook – whose European headquarters are in Dublin – about the changes.

via Data cops: Facebook privacy plans must be ‘modified’ • The Register.

Facebook to Help Brands Track Ad-Driven Sales | Adweek

I’m amazed that Facebook are only just doing this now – Advertising.com have done it for years as have most other networks.

Here’s how the self-serve tool works. Marketers add a piece of code from Facebook to whichever site pages they want to measure conversions on, be it a checkout page or an email newsletter sign-up page. When users click on a Facebook ad that leads them to that page, Facebook will see that the page loaded and count it as a conversion in the marketer’s Ads Manager dashboard.The real key is that the tool can unlock the full path to conversion from a Facebook ad.

via Facebook to Help Brands Track Ad-Driven Sales | Adweek.

Dear Laurette

I received a lovely (spam) email from ‘Laurette’ this morning. Although I’m tempted by the tequila I’m consigning this to the bin.

Laurette Khan ? [email protected]
01:57 (8 hours ago)

How’s it going pretty! 🙂
It’s Laurette.
If you are interested in spending great time in a company of funny, sex appeal woman then I am right before u!
I felt in love with ur pics and that’s why decided to send this mail! Think that u wouldn’t stay calm after checking up mine too.
So, I’m waiting for you to answer this mail and who knows we will go somewhere, drink some tequila, discuss different things and maybe I’ll invite u to visit my home! 😉

Twitter Weekly Round Up for 2010-06-27

First of what I feel may be many posts about Lotus Notes

Why do I need to know what database I am connecting to? Why do I need to have a degree in computer science to change the default browser?

I’ve got my lovely new MacBook Pro in the office so need to set up a whole heap of preferences in Notes – of course not all the preferences are in preferences some are within individual tasks.

Current problem is trying to set up a mailing list – should be a fairly simple task but so far having checked about 800 menu items am unable to find it. The nearest I have found is Groups but with a description that includes ‘Multi-purpose’ groups are the default group type and used in most situations. They can be used for access control and email purposes. I’m a little wary of breaking the internet!

Google Contacts Nightmare

So a slight problem recently with contacts.
I use a number of tools and web apps in my daily life to keep things organised beacuse I work for myself I use a number of machines in a number of offices so it’s easier to rely on web applications for some tasks.

30 boxes (30boxes.com) for a calendar as this also allows my partner to add events and we can keep track of what nights we have free for stuff which is nice.
Gmail (gmail.com) for email as it’s usually reliable and has heaps of storage space and I like the search
plaxo (plaxo.com) for keeping my contacts up to date
linkedin (linkedin.com) for business contacts
mobile me (me.com) because it came free with my iPhone and works with my MacBook address book

The problem I have now is syncing al the data.

This used to be easy as every now and then I would sync with plaxo to my work machines and that would pick up new contacts and I would dump them into Gmail manually. Not too painful and simple.

Now though the iPhone sync has got the better of me. Gmail has a whacked-out idea of contacts management in that email addresses are automatically added to your contacts list each time you use the reply, reply to all, or forward functions to send messages to addresses not previously stored in your contacts list. Sounds great in theory. In practise I don’t actually know a lot of those people and I may not want them in my contacts list.

iPhone has imported contacts from Gmail bringing all this random data and that has synched with mobile me and now my phone has 1800+ contacts only around 300 of which I actually added myself.

Google what are you thinking adding all these people to my contacts list without asking me?
Apple what are you doing allowing me to sync with data that is so different from my original set without setting off alarm bells somewhere.

Gah!