Thanks North America Scholar Consortium. Now I’m the douchebag.
So today, one of my close friends gets an e-mail stating that she had been invited to a scholar program. The “North America Scholar Consortium”. It was delivered to her UNT e-mail. By the lack of information in the e-mail, and the fact that it was the following:
3 April, 2009
Dear K*****, K**** L,
As a result of your dedication to scholarly success in University of North
Texas, North
America Scholar Consortium extends to you an invitation to apply for
membership in the NASC Honor Society. Membership application is by
invitation only; therefore, membership is a special honor afforded to
a small group of outstanding students.Membership applications are available at
http://inv.naschonor.org//lt.php?id=ZkgDBQxQxxxITQMfBxxxCAME Please use
your
assigned invitation code when you apply.Invitation Code: xxxxxxx
To learn more about the opportunities that accompany NASC Honor
Society membership, please visit
http://inv.naschonor.org//lt.php?id=ZkgDBQxQV1EBTQMxxxVCAME for more
information. I encourage you to seize this valuable and rewarding
opportunity and look forward to seeing your name among the next list
of new NASC Honor Society members!Sincerely,
Louis Birch
President 2009-2010
NASC Honor Society
So I start to do some digging. I had never heard of this scholar program and shes psyched that shes done so good in school that she’s gotten this e-mail. Just by the way the e-mail was formatted, a lack of phone number and further details as to what they do got me suspicious and made me smell a rat.
So I google the name to find the #1 search result to see if this may be a phishing scam. Nope, the website referenced is the #1 result. Okay so far so good. Whois returns:
Created On:30-Oct-2008 17:55:00 UTC
okay, 6 months old… kinda fishy but not completely out of the question.
Registrant ID:GODA-055102752
Registrant Name:Registration Private
Registrant Organization:Domains by Proxy, Inc.
Registrant Street1:DomainsByProxy.com
Registrant Street2:15111 N. Hayden Rd., Ste 160, PMB 353
Registrant Street3:
Registrant City:Scottsdale
Registrant State/Province:Arizona
Registrant Postal Code:85260
Registrant Country:US
You would think a legitimate organization would have contact details. Strike 1.
Membership Application Form
By Invitation Only
Application submission is free of charge. Please DO NOT send us any payment at this stage.
A life-time membership fee of $68 will be required only if your application is approved.
BZZZZ strike 2. Something like this is usually sponsored and free.
No phone number on the contact us page? Strike 3. Its a scam.
I go to tell my friend this and she has called her mom and told her how cool it is and i tell her its a scam. I swear she almost started crying.
UPDATE: As it turns out. She did cry after she left the room. ASSHOLES I’m going to find you.
It’s one thing to phish and spam. But to use something like a fake scholars program, that’s just not cool.
Thanks assholes, now i feel like a douche bag for something you got her hopes up on.
Jackasses. I hope you burn in hell.
WOW, Yea something must be up because usually i don’t do background checks on stuff like this but obviously something about it gave me a fishy feeling. I attend Unversity of Toledo and I got pretty happy about this to until I saw that some of my friends who only went to half there classes and slept everyday got the email as well. I also just thought it was fishy because there was no links off the website and there wasn’t that much info, it just restated the same things: this is a selective society, your the best at your university, good for a resume. One of the main reasons I’ve started getting weird about it is because they all have the membership fees so it would be easy for them to make money because alot of people would probably pay them but then not even do anything with it. This is messed up and I hope it does get investigated somehow
YOu hold em,… I’ll hit em…
I got the same E-mail and at first ignored it. Then I found out that it looks really good on your resume when going for a Federal Job. They actually give you extra points if your involved in a honor society. So I started looking into it more. Its really sad what people will do and not even think of the ramifications to others. Makes you wonder about what kind of conscience people have these days.
Wow! I feel so stupid now! Iwas one of the one’s that actually fell for it. I did end up paying the $68.00 and put it on my resume. It’s sad that people like them make so much money off of innocent people like me. I wonder how many other people fell for it. I really hope that not that many. This sucks
I also got this scam letter from nasc. I wrote back that i had a 4.0 average. ( untrue). They accepted me with the highest honor. I left all the areas blank on the application for honors and achievements also. I actually have a 3.8 and am in other honor societies. This one just didn’t seem quite right to me. Glad I found this website to make sure. Glad I never sent the $68 and my credit card number.
LMAO I got this very same letter too, wow thanks for the heads up.
I received the same email awhile back but soon discovered it was a sham. The following things led me to know NASC is a scam:
(1)the NASC website had no contact details at all (not even an email); I had to re: the email I was sent
(2) there was never a response to the return email I sent asking questions (as a result of this post I know why lol)
(3)there was no deadline in the email (most honor society memberships I’ve received have had a deadline)
(4) the GPA req. was lower than most (most of the reputable societies have a min. 3.5 GPA req @ first)
(5)when I typed in “NASC” I got hits for either “scam” or “NASCAR” lol.
I AM SO MAD! I have a freaking 3.9+ GPA… and was psyched to be “invited” into an honor society. I filled out the form and was accepted with the highest honors, but waited to send in my “fee.” I only waited because we were planning a big vacation & spent a lot on that. Later, planning on paying the fee, I typed in the address & my browser pulled this site up…I’m sooooo glad!! What’s bad, this email was sent through university “filtered” email. I thought it was real. Thanks for this site.
I got the same email and I thought I was all smart too… which i may be but I was happy to have been invited to a “scholarly” club, no matter how lame that sounds, it’s like being invited to the chess club. Anyway, after reading this… which was the top hit on a google search of the clubs name… no further research required! Glad to have found it! What a joke! Thanks for the help.. could have been more of a waste of my time!
I paid for this in April. I feel like such an idiot. Does anyone know what I should do? I want my money back, and I’m worried about my information. DAMMIT!
Ooohh! I fell for this one hook line and sinker. I wasn’t going to do it but my husband said “yeah go for it. It’ll look good on your resume.” They got my money back in April and I have been waiting for more info ever since. Tried to go back to their website today and found nothing so I googled and found this site. Man am I PO’d. Guess I wasn’t so damned smart after all.
Interesting… I got the mail 3 months ago… but didn’t do anything. Today I wanted to add it to my resume and guess what: I see this forum (instead the website)!!!.. Praise be God for this forum!!!
It would be very interesting to know how many (hundreds? thousands?) of people like us paid their membership and got this forum instead!!!
Life is short, live it good!
I FEEL STUPID. so today I was in a cheerful mood and I wanted to actually buy a sweatshirt from this damn "society" and I am searching for their website and its not coming up at all. Then I come across this; I am upset. I paid the damn $68 because I was so excited about doing good in school (as many has said), and plus it was nice to be noticed especially at my university and being a minority.I cant believe I paid those suckers. ugh . I hope they fall in a ditch.
You should check out this guy who applied:
http://emailsfromcrazypeople.com/2009/08/31/lax-admissions-policy/
With credentials even a psychopath would reject.
I was just about to link to the E-mails From Crazy People page. Obviously, they don’t even read the applications, they’re just after your credit card information.
Hey, i understand what you are going through, I fell for it and paid the money, but I just wanted to correct something you said, these things are not free, even the legit ones. You do have to a pay a lifetime membership fee. I belong to three other honor societies, which are legit, they do have chapters on my campus and this that and the other, but I did have to pay to join. This is why I believed these people, and I like your friend cried. I feel totally disappointed and have no idea how to tell my mom. Now I feel like dumbass and and wonder how I could have fallen for this. Is there anyway to get that money back, do you know? Anyway, sorry about your friend.
I feel for this too last year! I don’t care so much about the money as my person information. Could they steal my identity?
I feel for it to in April. I haven’t heard anything from it since and thought I would do some research today. I was surprised because it came to my school email and I rarely get spam there.
I FELL FOR THIS MESS TOO!!!! I WANT MY MONEY BACK!!!! THIS MESS HAS BEEN ON MY RESUME AND MY SIGNATURE IN EMAILS FOR A WHILE!!! F.M.L.!!!
To meleepete: I agree other honor societies do make you pay fees and that’s why I believed personally and my GPA was good enough!!
Go Figure!! Oh Well, Karma will get ‘Louis Burch’ because nothing good comes from screwing people over all the time.
I fell for this scam myself and would love to be notified if there is ever legal actions taken against these scum bags…