I just got an IM on AIM from "nephewofacoho", whom I don't know: "THIS MESSAGE VIOLATES THE CYBER-BULLYING ACT OF 2007!!!!! PLEASE REPORT IT TO THE FBI!!!!!!". I occasionally get spam/phishing IMs on MSN, but this one contained no links, so I found it odd, and I searched for the username.
Turns out it's a harmless prank system. According to this blog post, the idea is that Person A (with screen name randomly guessed from various placed on the Internet, like Twitter) gets a fake message under a fake screen name. If they reply, the message goes to Person B, but with a different fake screen name, and this is the first time Person B has heard from Person A. Person B's responses appear under the original fake screen name, and Person A thinks that Person B IMed first. They then accuse each of spamming the other. Hilarity ensues?
Sadly, my Internet instincts prevented me from responding to the initial message, so I have no conversation to report. :P Now if you get a random IM from a screen name ending in Coho, Salmon, or Trout, you'll know what happened.
Comments (2)
I get those all the time on yahoo... they're randomly generated user names.
Posted by Anonymous | January 28, 2009
Actually, they're not entirely random. There's a complete list of them here.
Posted by ToastyKen | January 28, 2009