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Unsolicited Email Response - You sent me your CV because???
Thread poster: Dylan J Hartmann
Robert Rietvelt
Robert Rietvelt  Identity Verified
Local time: 14:29
Member (2006)
Spanish to Dutch
+ ...
By the way ..... May 30, 2017

DJHartmann wrote:

So, I've been getting a fair few unsolicited emails from linguists in my language pair. I generally apologise politely saying that I work alone and don't need anything more to worry about etc. etc. (my direction is Thai-English).

Today I received a very formal unsolicited email from a gentleman which said:
"Dear Sir/Madam,

I am writing to introduce myself as an accredited and experienced freelance translator and researcher.

With a multicultural background and as an Arabic Native speaker, I have been working as a freelance translator for more than 8 years. I have worked on a variety of projects translating from Arabic into English and vice versa acquired experience in many areas from technics, medicine to finance, legal and marketing. I am now looking for new challenges in my career."


Arabic!? What was he thinking? Do many of us freelancers run agencies that handle multiple languages in our free time or had this guy just spammed the whole ProZ listing?

So, at 1:00am in the morning my response was as frank as could be:
"I’m a freelance Thai>English translator…. why would I ever need your Arabic services?

You haven’t done very good research for an 'accredited researcher'….dumbass"




[Edited at 2017-05-29 15:42 GMT]


... I am receiving these kind of mails too. Some of them have unbelievable backgrounds, like Harvard, Cambridge, Oxford, or all 3 of them, and heaps of experience. Makes me wonder why they choose for a low paid job as freelance translator?

Do what I do, delete them.


 
Katarzyna Slowikova
Katarzyna Slowikova  Identity Verified
Germany
Local time: 14:29
English to Czech
+ ...
Another gmail user here! May 30, 2017

Robert Rietvelt wrote:

Matthias Brombach wrote:


Rule of thumb: gmail adress (or domain / host) = ring your inner alarm bells...


I am using gmail (albeit under my own paid domain name, got 3 of them), so I am a scammer? Thank you very much!

What is this nonsense? (and no, I am not on the list).

[Edited at 2017-05-30 09:17 GMT]


I also use gmail and one other free email provider and think it's totally fine for a translator though not so much for an agency. If an agency sends you an introductory email from Gmail or hotmail, it's 100% scam.

I'm apparently lucky not to be on any of those lists since I do not receive emails from translators (real or fake). Almost all of the ID theft scam examples here were of fake agencies giving out work, so it's interesting to have one specimen in the other direction. Have to say it looks much more professional and credible then the emails sent by the "agencies". And I TOTALLY understand DJHartmann's reaction, though it was not that smart, now that we know it's a scammer.

One advice to DJHartmann: please send the CV that was attached to the www.translator-scammers.com, so that the translator whose CV was stolen can be warned. Next time it can be you (or any of us).

[Edited at 2017-05-30 14:30 GMT]


 
Matthias Brombach
Matthias Brombach  Identity Verified
Germany
Local time: 14:29
Member (2007)
Dutch to German
+ ...
It is useful to discuss these issues again and again May 30, 2017

Katarzyna Slowikova wrote:

I also use gmail and one other free email provider and think it's totally fine for a translator though not so much for an agency. If an agency sends you an introductory email from Gmail or hotmail, it's 100% scam


... just because these scam attempts come and go in waves, just because to skim off all new and inexperienced translators (and outsourcers) joyning the "industry" at intervalls.
You are right with your assumption and attitude, and one should not forget that holders of gmail adresses cannot be traced by an IP adress associated with the mail header. Hm, said that, I wonder why shouldn´t I ...


 
José Henrique Lamensdorf
José Henrique Lamensdorf  Identity Verified
Brazil
Local time: 10:29
English to Portuguese
+ ...
In memoriam
I don't think free e-mail service is okay for translators May 30, 2017

Katarzyna Slowikova wrote:

Matthias Brombach wrote:
Rule of thumb: gmail adress (or domain / host) = ring your inner alarm bells...


I also use gmail and one other free email provider and think it's totally fine for a translator though not so much for an agency.


I think I read somewhere in Gmail's user agreement fine print that, since their service is free, Google is allowed to scan for content in messages and attachments passing through their system and, if they like something, it's okay for them to index and publish it, as long as copyrights are respected.

Not sure if it's true, but in fact as they give e-mail service for free, they can't be accountable for security, non-disclosure etc. It's like a wall-owner who lets anyone pin their notes there for free.

I use a premium e-mail service, top security, antispam, antivirus, and other features there. Yet I pay less than USD 5 per month. My messages storage volume is technically limited to 10 GB, merely for disk space allocation purposes. If I need more, they'll give me more 10 GB chunks as I need them, at no extra charge.

Meanwhile translation clients have me sign very strict NDAs, make me accountable for security leaks, demand that I have a firewall, antivirus, etc. Many demand having the most expensive CAT tools, often for no reason at all. This turns my $5/mo. cost into a drop-in-the-bucket kind of thing.

Yet, if something sensitive leaks from my $5/mo. e-mail service, and the translation client sues for $1 million and wins, that company IS accountable and AFAIK they do have that kind of money.

The same applies to Yahoo, Hotmail, and other free e-mail services.


 
Katarzyna Slowikova
Katarzyna Slowikova  Identity Verified
Germany
Local time: 14:29
English to Czech
+ ...
Free email is fine and don't mix apples with oranges May 30, 2017

Matthias Brombach wrote:

one should not forget that holders of gmail adresses cannot be traced by an IP adress associated with the mail header.


The same is true about Hotmail, that's why the scammers use them.

@José Henrique Lamensdorf: This has been discussed thousand of times. It's a question of what makes up for a professional image in a given country - yes, it's very country specific. If an agency set a rule that they're not going to work with any translator using free email in my language pairs, they'd end up with almost no translators at all.
As to the privacy concerns you described, I just don't think it's the case/is likely. Interestingly, no agency (or direct client, though I don't have much of them) has ever protested my usage of gmail, including those with lots of NDA's and other paperwork to sign.

But most of all, please do not confuse this (imho) PR issue with agencies using gmail or hotmail. This is a technical issue and almost 100% sign of a scam: gmail and hotmail are used for the sole reason of the IP of the sender being untraceable. A legitimate agency has no reason to use them, having in most cases a website with paid domain, and they'd look like scammers, if they did (again, not because it "looks bad" but because it's a reliable sign of scam).

That being said, the dumbest scammers do not even know about the advantage gmail and hotmail gives them and use other free emails. Dumbasses, to quote DJHartmann.


 
Sheila Wilson
Sheila Wilson  Identity Verified
Spain
Local time: 13:29
Member (2007)
English
+ ...
It isn't the cost, AFAIC May 30, 2017

José Henrique Lamensdorf wrote:
I use a premium e-mail service, top security, antispam, antivirus, and other features there. Yet I pay less than USD 5 per month. My messages storage volume is technically limited to 10 GB, merely for disk space allocation purposes. If I need more, they'll give me more 10 GB chunks as I need them, at no extra charge.

I would have absolutely no problem with paying, as I already do for my antivirus etc. However, I used to use the email service of my ISP back in France, so it was a supposedly good one. However, they went bust or got taken over (I don't remember the exact details) and that was that! Hundreds if not thousands of emails disappeared overnight .

I'm just not prepared to risk that again. I can't see the same happening to Gmail, although I hope I don't have to eat those words . I've never had the slightest hint of being refused a job because I use a Gmail account. To change addresses now, after 8-9 years of trouble-free use would seem to be an over-reaction, and one that would undoubtedly lose me work, as many of those who have my current address wouldn't take the trouble to track me down, and I certainly don't know who they all are.

Hotmail is totally different. I use it for the stuff that's likely to cause trouble - all those newsletters and forum notifications (apart from the ProZ.com ones!) that seem like a good idea for a while before they become spam, holiday enquiries, Facebook, etc. I get loads of unwanted rubbish - spams and scams - and it's been hacked at least twice. You'd be mad to use Hotmail for work.


 
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