A couple of months ago, a friend died. He was a good friend, a funny friend, a caring friend and a spectacularly intelligent and inspiring friend.
Today, he emailed me.
Except it wasn't him. His account had been hacked by someone promoting some spammy link which like as not would have infected my laptop with a myriad different viruses had I clicked on it. I don't understand spam at all. I don't understand why people do it or what benefit people derive from it.
This spam is the worst spam I think I have ever had. Not for the content, but because of its unwitting cruelty. Everyone in my friend's address book (including, presumably, his parents and sister) will have received an email from 'him' today. Each of these people, after weeks of missing him terribly, will have experienced that most fleeting split-second glimmer of hope when they saw his name in their inbox and thought, despite all that they knew to have happened, 'he's alive!'
That is so awful. And I know what you mean, my brother died more than ten years ago now and still very occasionally when the phone rings for a splitter than split second I think - ah, that'll be Chris. So to receive an email from 'him' would be heartbreaking and set the healing process back a fair bit.
ReplyDeleteI mean, as you say, it wasn't done knowingly. But that's the point - it's spam - it doesn't care - it's a numbers game. I suppose. I don't get it either!