A scammer shows me a new trick, which I feel compelled to pass on to you lot (as a warning).

Contacted by a stray on my yahoo messenger. I allow these contacts caz basically - they're fun  :-)

A girl in a strange country, 30 yrs old but giving me pics of a 24-ish girl, without family to help her. Living on the charity of friends that give her money for food. You can see where this will go, eh?

We get on alright & I avoid some of her more scheming questions by asking her why she sends me old pics of herself & not more recent ones or what the time is with her now (so she has to check, if she's somewhere else). She tries unsuccessful to get back to her questions, but I consider myself about 3 steps ahead.

I'm asked if I talk to other girls & of course, being truthful I say "yes". I'm a friendly communicative guy.

She doesn't like that I use the same messenger ID for her as with the other girls & so asks me to set up a separate ID just for the 2 of us.

I ask her innocently which ID I should choose & she tells me to use my name & part of her ID.

Now setting up a new yahoo ID requires the verification from another of your email addresses. You get sent an email that requires you to click on the verification link & now, legally speaking, you are responsible for everything that the new email address & ID is connected with.

Being 3 steps ahead allows me not to give her my password when she asked for it.

She said she wanted to keep a check on me, that I wasn't communicating with other girls on "our" ID.

I said that I copied & pasted the random password into my messenger program & promptly forgot it, as my program will automatically log me on. In fact, that's true, except I call recall the password if I need.

When she insisted I find it, I asked how could we have a relationship of trust when she was going to be checking up on me in that way. I refused to be tested in that way & said I didn't want that type of relationship. She backed down.

I'm still keeping up the act & will tell you all if I learn any other new bits.

Be wary caz a scammer doing badness to someone with the email you set up, that she promptly takes over, changes the password & locks you out, is going to end up with you in hot water.

Will do another blog soon on how to trip up a person & find out if you are talking to a young girl, man or even young boy - rather than the woman of whatever age is mentioned.

Take care out there  ;-)