Academic Spam!!

Hi Folks,

Today, I received the following email on my current academic email ID:

Dear Dr. Jeetender Chugh,

I am writing on behalf of an international publishing house, LAP Lambert Academic Publishing.

In the course of a research on the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, I came across a reference to your thesis on “NMR in Proteomics: Investigations on Large Protein Assemblies and Method Developments”.
We are an international publisher whose aim is to make academic research available to a wider audience.
LAP would be especially interested in publishing your dissertation in the form of a printed book.

Your reply including an e-mail address to which I can send an e-mail with further information in an attachment
will be greatly appreciated.

I am looking forward to hearing from you.
Kind regards,
Tatiana Costandachi
Acquisition Editor

LAP LAMBERT Academic Publishing AG & Co. KG
Saarbrücken
Dudweiler Landstraße 99, 66123 Saarbrücken Germany

Fon +49 681 3720-310
Fax +49 681 3720-3109

t.costandachi(at)lappublishing.com / www.lappublishing.com

Handelsregister Amtsgericht Saarbrücken HRA 10752
Partner with unlimited liability:
VDM Verwaltung Aktiengesellschaft

Board of Directors: Dr. Wolfgang Müller (CEO), Christoph Schulligen, Esther von Krosigk

Supervisory Board: Prof. Dr. Johannes G. Bischoff (Chairman), RA Thomas Bischoff, RA André Gottschalk

A pretty impressive letter, and a very sophisticated spammer. They managed to dig out my Institute name and my thesis title correctly and then emailed me on my current academic email address, hmmm. I immediately checked on google, and found several blogs mentioning the receipt of similar letters. Cool thing is, if you search their website, you will find one (which can be made by spending a couple of hundred dollars easily). So, if you respond to the email, you will be asked to send your “Bank Account Details” for the so-called annual royalty deposits. Interestingly, they mention this on their FAQ page that it is OK to send them the account details as it is a very common process in Germany. I also believe that its more than just sending your account details, as they mention that you can just open a brand new account specially for this purpose and then send those details, which sounds quite safe. Is it possible that they can play with your thesis/paper (once they have all doc files)? I am confused.

Uncategorized | cjeet | September 10, 2010 9:52 am

8 Comments

By Nagaraja K K, October 20, 2010 @ 6:00 am

Jeetender,

I am surprised!! how they got your thesis title and institute name.

I don’t have any idea about this. I am hearing this for the first time.

Anyways, take right steps
By Hesting, April 1, 2011 @ 3:29 am

Hi,

I’m a German food blogger and I know some of my “colleagues” received similar e-mails from other service agencies. Somehow this is indeed getting common in Germany or German-speaking countries to trick Internet users this way. Look for blog entries on the Paperblog issue, if you like. 🙂

I don’t suggest to make use of this “offer”. Your thesis topic should be much to special for these people, I think. They’re just eager to gain other data from you (your address or maybe your bank account details).

Regards,
H.
By omid, May 28, 2011 @ 12:16 am

Hello Chugh
Yesterday, I received the exact email on my academic email as you had received. they had indicated the name of my thesis and my university. I don’t if I can trust them.
By Indranil Saha, July 18, 2011 @ 1:25 pm

Dear Jeetender,

Today I have received the similar email you have mentioned above and was a bit surprised. I immediately searched in the internet with the sender’s name and found your posting. I would like to know what step you took with the thesis publishing proposal, and what the outcome was. I would appreciate any advice you can provide on this.

Thanks,
Indranil Saha.
By Archit, October 31, 2011 @ 8:52 pm

Thanks Jeetender to report about this academic spam… Here is the spam mail that I recieved from LAP !!!…

I am writing on behalf of an international publishing house, LAP Lambert Academic Publishing.

In the course of a research on the Nanyang Technological University, I came across a reference to your thesis on “Electrostatically driven resonator working at 10 Mhz”.
We are an international publisher whose aim is to make academic research available to a wider audience.
LAP would be especially interested in publishing your dissertation in the form of a printed book.

Your reply including an e-mail address to which I can send an e-mail with further information in an attachment
will be greatly appreciated.

I am looking forward to hearing from you.

Kind regards,
Tatiana Costandachi
Acquisition Editor

LAP LAMBERT Academic Publishing GmbH & Co. KG
Address: Dudweiler Landstraße 99
66123 Saarbrücken Germany

Fon +49 681 3720-310
Fax +49 681 3720-3109

t.costandachi(at)lappublishing.com / http://www.lappublishing.com

Handelsregister Amtsgericht Saarbrücken HRA 10752
General unlimited partner:VDM Management GmbH
Managing directors: Thorsten Ohm (CEO), Dr. Wolfgang Philipp Müller, Esther von Krosigk, Christoph Schulligen
By Sergio Angeli, February 7, 2012 @ 10:47 am

Today I received exactly the same email, which looks quite professional. I am wondering if any of you, or anyone you know, published her/his thesis with this company.

Thanks,
Sergio
By Chitrakalpa Sen, June 6, 2012 @ 5:45 am

Hi,

Its not a spam. I have a book published with Lambert. You can check the url: http://www.amazon.com/Indian-Foreign-Exchange-Market-Volatility/dp/3847346512/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1338978891&sr=8-3.

And the bank acct number is usually for transferring the royalty money (dont expect any royalty payment, as your thesis isn’t exactly a John Grisham bestseller).
By alireza, June 12, 2012 @ 12:41 pm

hi,

i have received such a email today, and i am not sure whether respond to it or send it to Spam box!!

please give me more information about it.