Latest scam: Phony academic conferences
There’s a new scam in town (or at least, one that’s new to me): Invitations to attend a fake academic conference so the “organizers” can get your personal information. Bob Grant recounts his experience with one such conference on this post on TheScientist.com.
He starts with this question, then gets into the gory details: “Are phony academic conferences the new Nigerian princes of the internet?” Oh, I sure hope not. It’s bad enough that legit scientific conference organizers have to watch out for overseas attendees who try to get invitations just to get in the country holding the meeting; the last thing we need is for legit attendees to have to worry that the conference is bogus.
