I’m a product manager for a company that makes downloadable software available on the Internet. I’m supposed to be business savvy about how the whole thing works, so it is very ironic that last night I was scammed out of $35 online.
SoulSeek is a piece of software that supports a peer-to-peer network for the purpose of trading MP3 music files. It’s one of the applications out there that has the RIAA and the music biz up in arms, but that is another story.
I opened SoulSeek up on my laptop last night to borrow some new song and received a message saying that my program was out of day and that I needed to upgrade. I actually haven’t stolen any music in months, so I figured that made sense. Digging in my memory, I tried to find the page where you download the latest version. I typed in “http://www.slsk.org”. I won’t link to it here, because I don’t want to increase its search traffic. What I found at that site was literal fraud.
Completely branded like the original SoulSeek (which is at http://www.slsknet.org for those of you who want a peer-to-peer, free of spyware or adware), this other site charges for a monthly membership. I was so pleased with SoulSeek before, and so brand loyal to their lack of bundling crapware, that I was happy to pay.
After I forked over what I thought was $18 for a twelve month membership, I was navigated to a page to download Limewire, a file program that runs on another peer-to-peer network. I knew immediately that I had been had. It all took three minutes.
I’m currently trying to track down the people behind the scam so that I can demonstrate due diligence to my credit card cpmpany to get them to reverse the charges. My bank told me that $32 dollars had been charged to my card and gave me a 1-800 number that connects to I-Pay.com, an online money collection service. I called the number only to speak to a woman in India who told me the computer was down, so no orders could be cancelled at this time.
The domain “slsk.org” is registered to someone named Harald Adlassnig at Day Networks, whom I’m currently trying to track down. The FTC is now very interested in online fraud (I’ve been to two conferences about it in the past week) and are pointing a careful eye at even legitimate companies. This Day Networks would be a no brainer, except for the fact that I think they are in another country. The code is “AT” and I have no idea what place that is.
Feeling dumb is the worst. I think wars could be started over it. Or I should say, have been.
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Site of the Day: Ms. Huffington’s collection of famous bloggers are just as boring as me!
I’m a product manager for a company that makes downloadable software available on the Internet. I’m supposed to be business savvy about how the whole thing works, so it is very ironic that last night I was scammed out of $35 online.
SoulSeek is a piece of software that supports a peer-to-peer network for the purpose of trading MP3 music files. It’s one of the applications out there that has the RIAA and the music biz up in arms, but that is another story.
I opened SoulSeek up on my laptop last night to borrow some new song and received a message saying that my program was out of day and that I needed to upgrade. I actually haven’t stolen any music in months, so I figured that made sense. Digging in my memory, I tried to find the page where you download the latest version. I typed in “http://www.slsk.org”. I won’t link to it here, because I don’t want to increase its search traffic. What I found at that site was literal fraud.
Completely branded like the original SoulSeek (which is at http://www.slsknet.org for those of you who want a peer-to-peer, free of spyware or adware), this other site charges for a monthly membership. I was so pleased with SoulSeek before, and so brand loyal to their lack of bundling crapware, that I was happy to pay.
After I forked over what I thought was $18 for a twelve month membership, I was navigated to a page to download Limewire, a file program that runs on another peer-to-peer network. I knew immediately that I had been had. It all took three minutes.
I’m currently trying to track down the people behind the scam so that I can demonstrate due diligence to my credit card cpmpany to get them to reverse the charges. My bank told me that $32 dollars had been charged to my card and gave me a 1-800 number that connects to I-Pay.com, an online money collection service. I called the number only to speak to a woman in India who told me the computer was down, so no orders could be cancelled at this time.
The domain “slsk.org” is registered to someone named Harald Adlassnig at Day Networks, whom I’m currently trying to track down. The FTC is now very interested in online fraud (I’ve been to two conferences about it in the past week) and are pointing a careful eye at even legitimate companies. This Day Networks would be a no brainer, except for the fact that I think they are in another country. The code is “AT” and I have no idea what place that is.
Feeling dumb is the worst. I think wars could be started over it. Or I should say, have been.
…
Site of the Day: Ms. Huffington’s collection of famous bloggers are just as boring as me!
