The newest type of internet scam is looking like ID theft attempts. The imagination of these jokers is getting rather sophisticated. The authors of The Scientist Blog have reported two of them just in the last 4 months!! The first was on Aug, 19th 2009. It had reported;

A month or two ago, David Iovannisci, a geneticist studying heart disease at Children’s Hospital Oakland Research Institute in California, received an email invitation to speak at the “1st International Cardiology Conngress” in Shanghai, to be held on 5-7 December of this year. The email, signed by Alex Li, provided a (now defunct) link to the conference program at www.internationalcardiologycongress.com, which listed several speakers from well-known institutions, both in the US and abroad.

The second, posted just yesterday, Nov 24th 2009, asks the question, “Are phony academic conferences the new Nigerian princes of the internet?” Well they just might be, only time will tell. The post goes on to say;

Last week, I received an email from someone going by the name of Alyssa Logan, who claimed to be “Youth Leader” at a group called the Action World International Organization (AWIO) and a member of the International Committee of the Red Cross. In the message, Logan invited me to the “Seventh Annual International Global combine Conference on Global Economy and Human Welfare” that AWIO was hosting.

To read more on these scam reports you will need to register for a free account on The Scientist Blog’s website. They will not end up sending you out a bunch of spam email, only email alerts that you decide you wish to see. So don’t let the fear of that prevent you from using this excellent resource. The two posts can be accessed directly below.

Another fake conference?
[24th November 2009]

Conference kerfuffle hits scientists
[19th August 2009]