By Zeus! Crazy email asks for help building a Trojan horse

Boy oh boy, I receive some weird emails from time to time.

Here’s the latest. It comes from “Emmanuel Church”, who has a religious-themed Yahoo email address. (No jokes please about having to have faith to cling onto a Yahoo Mail account).

Just going by the email address, I expected it to be a bog-standard 419 scam. But it was something rather different.

Greetings from afar,

I am sorry to bother you, but I was wondering if therre is any possibility for you to get or build the zeus trojan for me. I am open to your terms and negotoations if that will be alright by you. I am a young man and interested in learning how to use the zeus trojan.

Thanks in anticipationof your favorable response. Nevertheless, always stay cool and calm.

Attached to the email is a password-protected .RAR archive file. Of course, I don’t know the password – so I have no idea what may be inside it.

How on earth am I supposed to respond to that?

Is this a practical joke, or is someone seriously asking for help building Zeus – one of the world’s most notorious Trojan horses?

I suspect this is the work of a crazy person. A nutter.

Which leads me to one obvious question: Is there a doctor in the horse? (groan…)

Found this article interesting? Follow Graham Cluley on Twitter, Mastodon, or Threads to read more of the exclusive content we post.

Graham Cluley •   @gcluley

Graham Cluley is a veteran of the cybersecurity industry, having worked for a number of security companies since the early 1990s when he wrote the first ever version of Dr Solomon's Anti-Virus Toolkit for Windows. Now an independent analyst, he regularly makes media appearances and is an international public speaker on the topic of cybersecurity, hackers, and online privacy. Follow him on Twitter, Mastodon, Threads, Bluesky, or drop him an email.