Simon Butcher

A few months ago, I woke up after a long sleep-in to find A looking a bit confused. She had just received a phone call from “Microsoft” who had detected a problem with our router. At least, it was a problem on our router, or perhaps a problem from our router. Either way, apparently there was some malicious problem with the computer here — which one, they did not say — and they were apparently calling to resolve the issue; in English, no less!

I shrugged it off as complete and utter bollocks, and life went on.

After speaking with my father in Australia today, it turns out he's received a few of these calls too. For him, it was “Microsoft” on Castlereagh Street in Sydney, although with a terrible phone line and some almost incomprehensible Asian accent it could have been anywhere.

The similarity between the two incidents seemed too much of a coincidence — it seems like our friends from the Republic of Poyais have returned.

Continue reading "Microsoft opens office in Poyais"

Scams will always exist as long as the general population of the world remain stupid and ignorant. I attribute any rise in the number of scams to be directly related to the state of the economy — any increase from the “normal” level of scams usually corresponds directly with any economic uncertainty within the market.

Unless you've been living under a rock for the last twelve months, you have surely noticed that there is a bit of a problem with the global economy. If you haven't noticed then you must have at least noticed that scams are on the rise; Ingenious as some of them may be, now is a good time to use your brain.

Continue reading "Welcome to the Republic of Poyais"