Happy Valentine’s Day! Yes, Chinese love birds get to celebrate twice a year with their loved ones. Chinese Valentine’s Day is set to fall this year on July 7th in the lunar calendar—that’s August 26 on the western calendar.
Chinese spammers have been using eventful holidays in the same way that English and European spammers have in order to spread their wares. We have observed spammers sending dating service advertisements and gift service site promotions for the upcoming Chinese holiday. Below you will find some examples of recent Chinese Valentine spam messages.
Chinese singles often go to the matchmaker temple and pray for luck in love or marriage. People call this matchmaker god “Yue Lao.” We see spammers using this name in email aliases to promote their dating service for this legendary holiday. The advertisement is simply an inserted dating service link for users to click on in the body.
From: 月老牽線 <Randomized>
Subject: 這次的多人聯誼您可以一起來
Translations:
From: Yue Lao Helper <Randomized>
Subject: You can join this blind date group
An online gift shop site sends a promotional ad for Chinese Valentine’s Day. Spammers send randomized email addresses with different promotional subject lines. Although their website looks professional, their “unsubscribe” process confirmed unsubscribe requests with random characters.
From: Randomized Email Alias
Subject: 在国外上xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx，给中国亲友送七夕情人节礼物真方便！
Translation:
Subject: Get on xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx when you are abroad, it's convenient to send a gift for Chinese Valentine's day! My thanks to blog contributor Ruby Yang.