I have received a message from Payment_Engine and a gmail address, with
a pdf attachment. I find that Payment Engine is a thing, but I do not
recognise it, nor the the address, nor the name which is the only text
in the message body. I knew somebody of that name, which is not
uncommon, about 20 years ago, at work. I very much doubt it is him.
I have not opened the attachment. What is the best course of action?
Just delete the whole thing, and if it turns out to be genuine, reply
that its purpose should have been made much clearer? Send it on to
somebody or other for investigation and possible action?

--
Davey.


--- MBSE BBS v1.1.1 (Linux-x86_64)
* Origin: A noiseless patient Spider (2:250/1@fidonet)

Davey wrote:

What is the best course of action?
Just delete the whole thing

This.

--- MBSE BBS v1.1.1 (Linux-x86_64)
* Origin: Air Applewood, The Linux Gateway to the UK & Eire (2:250/1@fidonet)

On Thu, 30 Oct 2025 09:11:10 +0000
Andy Burns <usenet@andyburns.uk> wrote:

Davey wrote:

What is the best course of action?
Just delete the whole thing

This.

Yup.

--
Davey.


--- MBSE BBS v1.1.1 (Linux-x86_64)
* Origin: A noiseless patient Spider (2:250/1@fidonet)

Reply-To: Adrian <bulleid@ffoil.org.uk>

In message <10dv95r$3i48u$1@dont-email.me>, Davey
<davey@example.invalid> writes

I have received a message from Payment_Engine and a gmail address, with
a pdf attachment. I find that Payment Engine is a thing, but I do not >recognise it, nor the the address, nor the name which is the only text
in the message body. I knew somebody of that name, which is not
uncommon, about 20 years ago, at work. I very much doubt it is him.
I have not opened the attachment. What is the best course of action?
Just delete the whole thing, and if it turns out to be genuine, reply
that its purpose should have been made much clearer? Send it on to
somebody or other for investigation and possible action?

I get a steady trickle of emails which contain no more than a weblink or
an attachment. I never follow the link or open the attachment. If the sender is genuine, then they will put some text in the mail which
explains why it is being sent. The purported business may be genuine,
but it doesn't follow that someone has borrowed their name for nefarious purposes.

I also get emails from time to time, which claim to be from one specific individual who I knew years back, but the actual email address is always different, always with no text, just a weblink. A good sign that it can
be ignored.

Do not reply. If it is spam/fraud then you are confirming to the
spammers that your address is active. That's assuming that the address
hasn't been forged, in which case either the reply will disappear into a
black hole, or end up in some poor unfortunates in box.

You could try putting the headers into something like SpamCop, which can
trace back where the email has come from, the chances are it wasn't from Gmail.

Adrian
--
To Reply :
replace "bulleid" with "adrian" - all mail to bulleid is rejected
Sorry for the rigmarole, If I want spam, I'll go to the shops
Every time someone says "I don't believe in trolls", another one dies.

--- MBSE BBS v1.1.1 (Linux-x86_64)
* Origin: Occasionally (2:250/1@fidonet)

Hello Davey!

30 Oct 25 08:55, Davey wrote to all:

I have received a message from Payment_Engine and a gmail address,
with a pdf attachment. I find that Payment Engine is a thing, but I do
not recognise it, nor the the address, nor the name which is the only
text in the message body. I knew somebody of that name, which is
not uncommon, about 20 years ago, at work. I very much doubt it is
him. I have not opened the attachment. What is the best course of
action? Just delete the whole thing, and if it turns out to be
genuine, reply that its purpose should have been made much clearer?
Send it on to somebody or other for investigation and possible action?

Mark it as JUNK so system will delete and remember the sender.

Does depend on your email reader.


Vincent



SEEN-BY: 25/0 21 250/0 1 2 4 5 8 13 14 362/6 371/52 712/1321

On Thu, 30 Oct 2025 12:02:55 +0000
Adrian <bulleid@ku.gro.lioff> wrote:

In message <10dv95r$3i48u$1@dont-email.me>, Davey
<davey@example.invalid> writes

I have received a message from Payment_Engine and a gmail address,
with a pdf attachment. I find that Payment Engine is a thing, but I
do not recognise it, nor the the address, nor the name which is the
only text in the message body. I knew somebody of that name, which
is not uncommon, about 20 years ago, at work. I very much doubt it
is him. I have not opened the attachment. What is the best course of >action? Just delete the whole thing, and if it turns out to be
genuine, reply that its purpose should have been made much clearer?
Send it on to somebody or other for investigation and possible
action?

I get a steady trickle of emails which contain no more than a weblink
or an attachment. I never follow the link or open the attachment.
If the sender is genuine, then they will put some text in the mail
which explains why it is being sent. The purported business may be
genuine, but it doesn't follow that someone has borrowed their name
for nefarious purposes.

I also get emails from time to time, which claim to be from one
specific individual who I knew years back, but the actual email
address is always different, always with no text, just a weblink. A
good sign that it can be ignored.

Do not reply. If it is spam/fraud then you are confirming to the
spammers that your address is active. That's assuming that the
address hasn't been forged, in which case either the reply will
disappear into a black hole, or end up in some poor unfortunates in
box.

You could try putting the headers into something like SpamCop, which
can trace back where the email has come from, the chances are it
wasn't from Gmail.

Adrian

A few days ago, I received an e-mail message from a company whose
sender name was very close to one I was expecting a message from, but it
wasn't them. It contained a pfd file which said it came from PayPal
saying that I had so many hours or days to cancel my McAffee renewal.
Since I have no McAffee, I knew that was a scam, but I worried about
having opened the pdf file. Nothing to be done now.
Thanks for the response.

--
Davey.


--- MBSE BBS v1.1.1 (Linux-x86_64)
* Origin: A noiseless patient Spider (2:250/1@fidonet)

On Thu, 30 Oct 2025 15:07:06 +0000
"Vincent Coen" <VBCoen@gmail.com> wrote:

Hello Davey!

30 Oct 25 08:55, Davey wrote to all:

I have received a message from Payment_Engine and a gmail address,
with a pdf attachment. I find that Payment Engine is a thing, but
I do not recognise it, nor the the address, nor the name which is
the only text in the message body. I knew somebody of that name,
which is not uncommon, about 20 years ago, at work. I very much
doubt it is him. I have not opened the attachment. What is the
best course of action? Just delete the whole thing, and if it
turns out to be genuine, reply that its purpose should have been
made much clearer? Send it on to somebody or other for
investigation and possible action?

Mark it as JUNK so system will delete and remember the sender.

Does depend on your email reader.

Vincent

Thanks. Thunderbird is my e-mail reader.

--
Davey.


--- MBSE BBS v1.1.1 (Linux-x86_64)
* Origin: A noiseless patient Spider (2:250/1@fidonet)

Davey wrote:

"Vincent Coen" wrote:

Mark it as JUNK so system will delete and remember the sender.
Does depend on your email reader.

Thanks. Thunderbird is my e-mail reader.

Depends whether your TB account has got adaptive junk controls enabled,
it generally takes several 'hints' from marking something as junk (or as
not junk) to alter the spam training database, but it all helps.


--- MBSE BBS v1.1.1 (Linux-x86_64)
* Origin: Air Applewood, The Linux Gateway to the UK & Eire (2:250/1@fidonet)