Letter to the Editor – “You learn something new every day”

Dear Editor,

There is a saying, “You learn something new every day.” I have learned several new things recently and would like to share that information. It is kind of a long story so bear with me. My husband had a report of someone calling into the local John Deere dealer asking if there was an equipment dealer south of Holly. The person called because he had seen a website listing a piece of equipment he was interested in. The employee at the dealer told them there was no dealership there.

The next day a semi-trailer pulled into our yard. The driver was from Alabama. He drove here from Denver checking on a Kubota tractor for a cousin that lived in Kentucky. They thought it was a scam since it was such a good price but they wanted to check it out anyway. That was just the beginning of what we were learning of a phishing website that had been set up using our physical address and the name of our LLC for the business name. That afternoon we had a couple of gentlemen from Colorado drive to our place looking for equipment. They had a signed contract in hand but they would not pay anything before they saw the equipment in person. At this point we also had the Town of Holly employees notifying me of calls received in their office checking on this business. The employees told them it was not legit and to call the Sheriff and also report this to the BBB.

I called the Prowers County Sheriff office myself to report this and was told there was nothing they could do at this time. They suggested to report it to Google. I then learned how to report a suspicious website to Google. After we received another phone call from a local resident notifying us of the website I began to research further of how to shut the website down. My next steps of action were to email a report to the Federal Trade Commission and the Colorado Attorney General. I received an email back from both just stating that they had received the report. Nothing telling me what I could do about the website. I also tried to send an email to the Colorado Secretary of State but it would not go through. I decided to call the Sheriff department again and this time asked to file a report. A deputy called me back to take a report
and said he would look at the website to see what he could do. People that had come to our yard so far were friendly and hadn’t been hurt financially; this may not be the result the next time. Last Friday we had a couple from Texas drive 8 hours to the address listed on this fake website looking for a piece of equipment which was not here.

As you do when faced with a problem, I spoke to several people regarding the frustration and what might be done to get this stopped. Fortunately my story made it to someone with an IT background who was able to offer great assistance. They gave me the details for the actual website host (which was in Lithuania) and from there I was able to send an email to their fraud department detailing the abuse and illegality of the site. I have since received a replying email from the website host abuse department stating the abusive website account had been suspended, an end to the story for now. This was not an easy lesson to come by and I wish I never had to learn it. That being said there is another saying that applies to this story, “You have to be your own advocate!” I am thankful to those who listened and tried to assist. I really
feel there should be more assistance at the ready for situations like this. I know all situations like this probably won’t be the same and have the same resolution. I just wanted to share our story in the hopes of it helping someone in the future.

Sincerely,
Mary Rushton