Traveling yacht crew depend on Internet communications through e-mail, social media and other online profiles. But, occasionally a message from a friend, friend of a friend, or a familiar name, is from an impostor.

These fraudulent messages are prevalent as schemes to get money and personal data continue to propagate online. These messages can come from a real friend's address that has been compromised or from a completely fictitious name. Initial messages often ask for a reply, but not specific information.

Hallmarks of these correspondences are familiarity. They address the reader as though a friend and use dialect and slang, for example, "I'm freaked out at the moment." Subject lines seem to be from a possible friend or acquaintance, "Very Urgent...Captain Simon" or "Subject: This Is Sad..........". 

Though more difficult to recognize as fraud, crew are encouraged to contact a known individual through a personal call, e-mail or old-fashioned phone call to verify if their crisis is real.

Several crew agencies and at least one crew member have received these type of messages recently and shared them with The Triton. Here are portions of two recent e-mails. (Grammar and punctuation have not been corrected.)

1. "Sorry I did not inform you about my trip. I came down here to Madrid, Spain for a short vacation unfortunately I was mugged at the park on my way to hotel where I stayed, all cash,credit card and cell were stolen off me but luckily for me I still have my passports with me.

“I've been to the embassy and the Police here but they're not helping issues at all and my flight leaves in a couple of hours but am having problems settling the hotel bills and the hotel manager won't let me leave until i settle the bills.

“I'm freaked out at the moment. I need urgent assistance."

2. "How are you? i traveled to wales for a conference at the Belfast, Northern Island) and unfortunately for me the hotel i lodged got razed by fire. all my valuables including cash, cell phones and my traveling documents were destroyed during the inferno but luckily for me i still have my passport with me.

i have contacted the police but they are not responding to the matter effectively they only asked me to write a statement about the incident and referred me to the embassy which is over there in United Kingdom

please i really need your assistance for me to go to the embassy and also to the airline office so i can start processing a new flight ticket. i am also having problems settling outstanding hotel bills and the hotel management are not helping matters at all please let me know if you can help me out

Waiting for your mail

Kind regards,Captain Simon"

About the Author

Dorie Cox

Associate Editor