How to spot fake emails like "Gold Fields Bullion Limited" email scam
Written by Tomas Meskauskas on
What kind of scam is "Gold Fields Bullion Limited"?
We examined this email and learned that it is a fake congratulatory letter from a company named "Gold Fields Bullion Limited" (there is a real gold mining company called Gold Fields Limited). Scammers behind this email attempt to trick recipients into believing that they have won an award. They encourage recipients to review the attachment (an image) for more information.
More about the "Gold Fields Bullion Limited" email scam
According to the attached letter, the recipient (company/community) has won $950,000,000 among three other winners. It instructs the recipient to indicate the name of a charity or organization for verification. The letter also mentions that the prize will be declined if Gold Fields Bullion Limited cannot verify the organization.
The letter provides the paisleymbatha@goldfieldsbullions.com email address for contacting a "project analyst" and providing "full details" (including a fake reference number). None of the statements in this letter are true. Thus, this email should be ignored and reported.
Scammers behind this campaign could be seeking to lure recipients into providing personal information, paying "administration" (or other) fees, or even providing remote access to computers or downloading malware. They can do that directly via email or the provided telephone number.
| Name | Gold Fields Bullion Limited Email Scam |
| Threat Type | Phishing, Scam, Social Engineering, Fraud |
| Fake Claim | Recipients have won $950,000,000 |
| Cyber Criminal Email Address | paisleymbatha@goldfieldsbullions.com |
| Disguise | Letter from a legitimate gold mining company |
| Symptoms | Unauthorized online purchases, changed online account passwords, identity theft, illegal access of the computer. |
| Distribution methods | Deceptive emails |
| Damage | Loss of sensitive private information, monetary loss, identity theft. |
| Malware Removal (Windows) | To eliminate possible malware infections, scan your computer with legitimate antivirus software. Our security researchers recommend using Combo Cleaner. |
Similar scams in general
In most cases, emails of this kind are disguised as official letters from legitimate entities (e.g., companies or organizations). Scammers often include real/existing (or similar) logos, phone numbers, website addresses, names and surnames, and other details in their emails to give them credibility.
Most scammers use such emails to extract money and (or) information, or distribute malware. A couple examples of email scams are "Please Confirm Your Account Email Scam", "Apple Invoice Email Scam", and "Windows Defender Email Scam".
How do spam campaigns infect computers?
When threat actors use email as a channel for malware distribution, they send letters containing malicious attachments or links. Either way, their goal is to lure recipients into executing malware. Usually, they use malicious MS Office or PDF documents, JavaScript files, executables, ISO files, or archive files containing malicious files to distribute malware.
How to avoid installation of malware?
Examine emails containing links or attachments before opening their contents. Especially when received emails are irrelevant and sent from suspicious (or unknown) addresses. Download software and files only from legitimate sources such as official websites and stores.
Do not use P2P networks, suspicious websites, third-party downloaders, etc., to download files or programs. Keep the operating system and installed software up to date. Never use third-party tools to update or activate any software (it must be achieved using tools provided by official developers).
If you've already opened malicious attachments, we recommend running a scan with Combo Cleaner Antivirus for Windows to automatically eliminate infiltrated malware.
Text presented in the "Gold Fields Bullion Limited" email letter:
Subject: Notice GFBL
Good Day,Your organization was selected for “Giving back to the community Award” in the 1st category of the ballot database of Gold Fields Bullion Limited 2022. Find Attached Letter, your claim reference number is GFBL-8783RT696ZA.
Regards,
Paisley Mbatha
Screenshot of the attached file:
Text presented in the attached image:
GOLD FIELDS BULLION LIMITED PTY
Premium Gold Bullion Refinery.Oct 10, 2022
Greetings!
Gold field bullion Limited has selected your organization through your email address for Gold Field Bullion 2022 interchange ballot promotion and award email survey draw program to encourage and support active email address that is associated to Gold fields Bullion trading database and online gold fields interconnection online marketing.
Your organization was selected for "Giving back to the community Award" in the 1st group of the ballot database of Gold Fields Bullion Limited 2022. Your community have been awarded to receive a total sum of US $950,000 (Nine Hundred & Fifty Thousand United States Dollars) which is credited to a ballot file. A total fund of US $6 million Shared amongst the five emails ballot selection with (3) lucky emails qualified and selected.
The board members of the Gold Fields Bullion Limited with the international partner of GFBL agreed to enrich lives through this award, giving-back to the community worldwide to help non-profitable organizations. If you receive this email and honestly have a genuine organization to reach out using our award, please indicate to us the name of your charity or organization for verification.
If we cannot verify your selected organization your prize will be decline, and your selection will be removed from the GFBC database system. You will take 50% of the total amount and 50% to the charity organization you have chosen. This will happen as soon as your award money is released to your desire bank account in your country through our chosen law firm and attorneys. Send up your full details to our project analyst Paisley Mbatha email: paisleymbatha@goldfieldsbullions.com
Your reach out process reference number is GFBL-8783RT696ZA.
Sincerely,
Yours Faithfully,
Ben Van Beurden
Chief Executive Director Gold Fields Bullion Limitedwww.goldfieldsbullions.com
info@goldfieldsbullions.com+27 638 64 9890
122 West St Sandown,
Sandton, 2031 South Africa
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Quick menu:
- What is Gold Fields Bullion Limited scam campaign?
- Types of malicious emails.
- How to spot a malicious email?
- What to do if you fell for an email scam?
Types of malicious emails:
Phishing Emails
Most commonly, cybercriminals use deceptive emails to trick Internet users into giving away their sensitive private information, for example, login information for various online services, email accounts, or online banking information.
Such attacks are called phishing. In a phishing attack, cybercriminals usually send an email message with some popular service logo (for example, Microsoft, DHL, Amazon, Netflix), create urgency (wrong shipping address, expired password, etc.), and place a link which they hope their potential victims will click on.
After clicking the link presented in such email message, victims are redirected to a fake website that looks identical or extremely similar to the original one. Victims are then asked to enter their password, credit card details, or some other information that gets stolen by cybercriminals.
Emails with Malicious Attachments
Another popular attack vector is email spam with malicious attachments that infect users' computers with malware. Malicious attachments usually carry trojans that are capable of stealing passwords, banking information, and other sensitive information.
In such attacks, cybercriminals' main goal is to trick their potential victims into opening an infected email attachment. To achieve this goal, email messages usually talk about recently received invoices, faxes, or voice messages.
If a potential victim falls for the lure and opens the attachment, their computers get infected, and cybercriminals can collect a lot of sensitive information.
While it's a more complicated method to steal personal information (spam filters and antivirus programs usually detect such attempts), if successful, cybercriminals can get a much wider array of data and can collect information for a long period of time.
Sextortion Emails
This is a type of phishing. In this case, users receive an email claiming that a cybercriminal could access the webcam of the potential victim and has a video recording of one's masturbation.
To get rid of the video, victims are asked to pay a ransom (usually using Bitcoin or another cryptocurrency). Nevertheless, all of these claims are false - users who receive such emails should ignore and delete them.
How to spot a malicious email?
While cyber criminals try to make their lure emails look trustworthy, here are some things that you should look for when trying to spot a phishing email:
- Check the sender's ("from") email address: Hover your mouse over the "from" address and check if it's legitimate. For example, if you received an email from Microsoft, be sure to check if the email address is @microsoft.com and not something suspicious like @m1crosoft.com, @microsfot.com, @account-security-noreply.com, etc.
- Check for generic greetings: If the greeting in the email is "Dear user", "Dear @youremail.com", "Dear valued customer", this should raise suspiciousness. Most commonly, companies call you by your name. Lack of this information could signal a phishing attempt.
- Check the links in the email: Hover your mouse over the link presented in the email, if the link that appears seems suspicious, don't click it. For example, if you received an email from Microsoft and the link in the email shows that it will go to firebasestorage.googleapis.com/v0... you shouldn't trust it. It's best not to click any links in the emails but to visit the company website that sent you the email in the first place.
- Don't blindly trust email attachments: Most commonly, legitimate companies will ask you to log in to their website and to view any documents there; if you received an email with an attachment, it's a good idea to scan it with an antivirus application. Infected email attachments are a common attack vector used by cybercriminals.
To minimise the risk of opening phishing and malicious emails we recommend using Combo Cleaner Antivirus for Windows.
Example of a spam email:
What to do if you fell for an email scam?
- If you clicked on a link in a phishing email and entered your password - be sure to change your password as soon as possible. Usually, cybercriminals collect stolen credentials and then sell them to other groups that use them for malicious purposes. If you change your password in a timely manner, there's a chance that criminals won't have enough time to do any damage.
- If you entered your credit card information - contact your bank as soon as possible and explain the situation. There's a good chance that you will need to cancel your compromised credit card and get a new one.
- If you see any signs of identity theft - you should immediately contact the Federal Trade Commission. This institution will collect information about your situation and create a personal recovery plan.
- If you opened a malicious attachment - your computer is probably infected, you should scan it with a reputable antivirus application. For this purpose, we recommend using Combo Cleaner Antivirus for Windows.
- Help other Internet users - report phishing emails to Anti-Phishing Working Group, FBI’s Internet Crime Complaint Center, National Fraud Information Center and U.S. Department of Justice.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)
Why did I receive this email?
Typically, scammers send the same letter to all email addresses that they have obtained after a data breach, via phishing pages, or in other ways. In other words, their emails are not personal.
I have provided my personal information when tricked by this email, what should I do?
Change all passwords if you have provided account credentials (e.g., username and password for your email or another account). If you have provided other personal information (e.g., credit card details, ID card information, social security number) or transferred money, contact the corresponding authorities as soon as possible.
I have downloaded and opened a file attached to this email, is my computer infected?
No, the file (image) attached to this email is not malicious.
I have sent cryptocurrency to scammers, can I get my money back?
Crypto transactions are irreversible. Thus, retrieving the transferred funds is impossible (unless scammers would do so by themselves).
Will Combo Cleaner remove malware infections that were present in email attachment?
Yes, Combo Cleaner can detect and remove almost all known malware. Since high-end malware usually hides deep in the operating system (it cannot be detected by running a quick scan), it is required to run a full scan to eliminate it.
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