|  |  | Hoaxes and Urban Legends: Forward or lose your Hotmail accountWhenever you receive an email that urges you to immediately forward that mail to everyone you know, there is a very good chance the email is a hoax. Please take the time to verify the message by doing a Google search before you send it on to anyone else. In most cases when you take an arbitrary sentence from the message and google for it you'll end up with many hoax warning pages as the result.
The following email is one such hoax. It claims that unless you forward it to 10 or 20 people your Hotmail will get deleted.
 
Please review:
 
Known email hoaxes:The AOL/Microsoft money giveaway hoax
 The "809" area code hoax
 The burned baby hoax
 Amy Bruce / Make A Wish hoax
 The "Invitation" virus hoax
 The "Life is beautiful" virus hoax
 The Oliver North / Osama bin Ladin / Al Gore hoax
 Send spam to the South African police to save children
 Exxon/Mobile gas boycott
 Bush IQ report / Lovenstein Institute hoax
 Monkeyman935 warning hoax
 Kidney Theft urban legend
 Ashley Flores, 13 (missing child hoax)
 How to detect a two-way mirror
 $50 call-back spam
 Cooking an egg with cell phones
 "Osama captured" / "Osama hanged" virus
 A tale of Japanese Lizards and Love
 The $5 killer
 Audi A8 made out of silver
 ATM PIN code entered in reverse will call the police
 Mars spectacularly close to Earth on August 27
 "An old lady walked into a Grocery Store..."
 "Allah or the Lord Jesus Christ?"
 "PDA+GSM Palm Treo 650 dan Treo 680 dan Treo 750"
 Bayer drug contains HIV
 Forward or lose your Hotmail account
 Chinese "fix" jet engine with seatbelts
 AOL will donate five cents for baby's brain cancer operation
 Ericsson distributing free laptops
 Art Bell Filipino hate letter
 Hypodermic needles on gas pump handles
 "Through a rapist's eyes" / Crying Baby theory
 Sheryl Crow / John Hopkins Cancer update about plastic bottles
 Children buried alive in Egypt, saved by Jesus
 Missing child - Regina George Muñoz
 Papaya Juice - (NOT!) A Cure for Dengue
 Hiroshima 64 years later (is actually Yokohama)
 Lou Dobbs video on Immigration/Amnesty bill (dead since 2007)
 
 
 
Example chain letter:
 
 
Subject: THIS IS VERY IMPORTANT! YOU COULD LOSE YOUR ACCOUNT OVER IT!Date: Fri, 4 Jan 2008 17:22:46 -0500
 
 Dear Hotmail User, [http://gfx1.hotmail.com/mail/w2/ltr/i_safe.gif]
 
 Because of the sudden rush of people signing up to
Hotmail,it has come to our attention that we are vastly
running out of resources. So, within a month's time, anyone who
does not receive this email with the exact subject heading, will be
deleted off our server.Please forward this email so that
we know you are still using this account.
 
 WARNING WARNING
 
 We want to find out which users are actually using their Hotmail
accounts. So if you are using your account, please pass this
e-mail to every Hotmail user that you can and if you do not pass
this letter to anyone we will delete your account.
 
 
 From Mr. Jon Henerd
 Hotmail Admin. Dept.
 
 Our hotmail system is getting to crowded!! We need you to forward this to at least 20 people. I know this seems like a large number, but we need to find out who is really using their account. If you do not send this to at least 10 Hotmail members, we will delete your account. Sorry for this inconvenience.
 
 Sincerely, Director of Hotmail Services
 Aaron Lopez
 
 
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