As you may recall, last spring I unravelled a scam in which someone pretending to be an attorney sent out phony DMCA takedown notices. That scam was centered around a website that pretended to be the law firm of Arthur Davidson Legal. Eventually, that website was suspended by its web hosting company. Well it appears that scam has popped-up again. This time in the form of a website that pretends to be the law firm of Nationwide Legal in Austin, Texas. 

Over the weekend I got an email from someone pretending to be a trademark attorney with the law firm of Nationwide Legal. I won’t link to it, but you can find it at nationwidelaw (dot) org. The email had all of the same tell-tale signs of being a fraud as the previous scam that employed a website pretending to be the law firm of Arthur Davidson. Those signs include not actually addressing me by name and not asking for anything other than a link to some shady website. Take a look at the screenshot of the email below and see what other signs of a scam you can spot. 

Other signs of the scam:

When I went to the website, I found the picture of the person who pretends to be “Alicia Weber, Trademark Attorney.” I then did a reverse image search of her picture and found that she also goes by the name of Maria and is a professor of history at MetaTeaching and appears on dozens of other websites. 

A variation on the same attorney website domain has already been suspended by its host. And once I report this one to its hosting company, I’m sure it will also be suspended. 

The lessons!

1. If you get an email from someone claiming to be an attorney, don’t believe it if they can’t even bother to address you by name. 

2. Don’t be a sleazy, lazy scammer.