Invalid Subpoenas Sent Via E-Mail: New And Dangerous Internet Scam

Thousands of company executives received e-mails mid-April that purported to be federal court subpoenas but instead appear to be part of a "phishing" scam to capture sensitive data. The invalid subpoenas: (a) bear the seal of the U.S. district court and docket numbers from real cases; (b) command an appearance before a grand jury; (c) identify the originating e-mail address as [email protected]; and (d) contain a link with an instruction to "download the entire document on this matter ... and print it for your record."

The Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts posted an alert on its web site that can be found at www.uscourts.gov. The alert is captioned "Notice: Invalid Subpoena" and states that e-mails containing grand jury subpoenas "are not a valid communication from a federal court and may contain harmful links." It reminds that the judiciary's address ends in ".gov" (not ".com") and states