Looking like a scam
Posted: Mon Jun 25, 2012 8:38 pm
Well, this whole situation has been fishy from the start, but I've done my best to hold off on jumping to conclusions, but...
It is looking more and more like those running this site are the real hijackers, while most of the "legitimate" employees went over to VC. That also explains the gmail account and their push for people to send them usernames and passwords (which would then allow the hijackers to log in impersonating members either into VC's member areas to steal content, or to log into the hijacked portions of the site in the hopes of finding billing info). Let's face it, passwords were likely encrypted and unaccessable even if looking straight into the database tables.
That would certainly explain their strong push for folks to email their passwords in (seriously, when have you ever heard of a legitimate company EVER asking a subscriber to send a password via email??).
The only "employee" we've had contact with was supposedly a PR Director who obviously never worked a day in "her" life in PR.
Makes me glad I used a different username/password/email/IP address to re-register with this site so they couldn't link me back to my original account in case this turned out to be a scam.
Phony deadlines, frequent pushes for passwords, a suspect "gmail" account, lack of any real contact info, and "official" announcements containing info that most if not all of us could plainly see didn't add up.... this is looking more and more like a scam. They are just stringing people along to collect as many usernames and passwords as they can.
BTW - many people use the same usernames and passwords everywhere (dumb I know), so a list of usernames and passwords from one site can be sold to those who want to try them elsewhere to see if they work (bank websites, etc.).
Hope I'm wrong, but 20 years as a private investigator tell me this smells rotten. At this point I'm just sticking around to see how it finally plays out, kinda like the bad movie you just can't stop watching because you just gotta see how it ends.
It is looking more and more like those running this site are the real hijackers, while most of the "legitimate" employees went over to VC. That also explains the gmail account and their push for people to send them usernames and passwords (which would then allow the hijackers to log in impersonating members either into VC's member areas to steal content, or to log into the hijacked portions of the site in the hopes of finding billing info). Let's face it, passwords were likely encrypted and unaccessable even if looking straight into the database tables.
That would certainly explain their strong push for folks to email their passwords in (seriously, when have you ever heard of a legitimate company EVER asking a subscriber to send a password via email??).
The only "employee" we've had contact with was supposedly a PR Director who obviously never worked a day in "her" life in PR.
Makes me glad I used a different username/password/email/IP address to re-register with this site so they couldn't link me back to my original account in case this turned out to be a scam.
Phony deadlines, frequent pushes for passwords, a suspect "gmail" account, lack of any real contact info, and "official" announcements containing info that most if not all of us could plainly see didn't add up.... this is looking more and more like a scam. They are just stringing people along to collect as many usernames and passwords as they can.
BTW - many people use the same usernames and passwords everywhere (dumb I know), so a list of usernames and passwords from one site can be sold to those who want to try them elsewhere to see if they work (bank websites, etc.).
Hope I'm wrong, but 20 years as a private investigator tell me this smells rotten. At this point I'm just sticking around to see how it finally plays out, kinda like the bad movie you just can't stop watching because you just gotta see how it ends.