John was checking his email one day, and he saw this
particular one, which was sent to him from someone he did not know. The subject
of the email sounded urgent, so instead of deleting it, John clicked on it to
read it.

Subject: 81 feared dead from swine flu in Mexico

I sent
this email to you with a very heavy heart. I’m sure you have heard of the recent
swine flu outbreak. Novel influenza A (H1N1) is a new flu virus of swine origin
that was first detected in April, 2009. The virus is infecting people and is
spreading from person-to-person, and has sparked a growing outbreak of illness
in the United States with an increasing number of cases being reported
internationally as well.

To date, A/H1N1 flu has killed 337 people in
121 nations and regions and the number of the total infected exceeded 80,000, a
top official of the World Health Organization (WHO) said on Thursday. There are
already 1003 cases in Singapore, a country known for its stringent health
measures.

Just FYI, in 1918, there was flu pandemic -commonly known as
the Spanish flu- which was caused by an unusually severe and deadly Influenza A
virus strain of subtype H1N1, claimed the lives of 50-100 million people.
Researchers are speculating if the one that is ongoing will have that high
number of death tolls, that is, if the pandemic persists.

I’ve attached
a file on how to protect yourself during this period of outbreak. I sincerely
urged you to take a look at it, so that you can take the said preventive
measures. You are not only protecting yourself, but also the people around you.

My cousin, who lives in Mexico, introduced me to a type of medicine that
is said to work effectively. I’ve also given you the link in the file
attachment. I strongly encourage you to purchase the medicine, as I have also
purchased it myself.


Yours sincerely,
Max Wilkertin

Now,
what should John do? Should he open the file attachment? Should he buy the
medicine?

Dawn:
I think that John should not open the file attachment. However, he could take a look at it. It is quite fake as the News has not announced this "medicine" for H1N1 yet. How could Max Wilkertin's friend know it exists? He should not buy the medicine. It is a scam, to cheat others. They might just pass of normal cough medicine for this "special" H1N1 medicine. I think scam mail like this is a very childish act.

Wei Ling:
I think that John should not open the file attachment. But if he wants to know what is inside the file attachment, he could take a glance of the contents inside. The file attached may contain viruses that will harm the computer. Max Wilkertin may gang up with his cousin and trick him into a trap. John should not buy the medicine, as the medicine may not be effective to the H1N1 flu. It may just be a flu or cough medicine, where you can get all this in hospitals, clinics, or polyclinics. The website that is attached to the file may contain harmful viruses too. In conclusion, this may be a scam mail and the information inside this file is most likely to be fake. This type of mails are normally sent to teenagers like us, and they will try the encourage you to buy the "special" medicine. The people will try to state in the mail that if you forward this message to more than 10 people or something, their lives will be saved, and they will not be affected by the H1N1 virus. People should not be so foolish and believe this type of scam mail. They should just listen to the news so as to update themselves on the latest H1N1 flu condition.