Making the Most of the Internet - Blog

 

Monday, July 02, 2007

United States National Medical Association

 

The National Medical Association is an association of black doctors in the United States, that states on their web site that :-

The NMA promotes the collective interests of physicians and patients of African descent. We carry out this mission by serving as the collective voice of physicians of African descent and as a leading force for parity in medicine, elimination of health disparities, and promotion of optimal health.

That sounds like a good set of ideals and nothing like those promoted by a con-site setup by one of the worst pollutors of the Internet, My Canadian Pharmacy.

You click to complain about a drug site on the US NMA site and you get directed to this load of crooks.

I did complain once to the Canadian High Commission and they didn't reply. I just added Canada to another country that I don't want to visit or buy product from. After all, who wants to go all the way across the Atlantic to get cold and bitten by midges, when you can get the same conditions in Scotland.

At least the Scots have several reasonable football teams who are worth watching. They also product the best falling down liquid in the world.

Labels: ,

4 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

I think you may be in error there. I agree with you wholeheartedly regarding the My Canadian Pharmacy, but I do not belive they are related. Firstly the organisation is The National Medical Association with the URL http://www.nmanet.org/

The troublesome SPAM use the URL http://www.us-nma.com/ which is not actually owned or a site, but the URL in the e-mail routes to other URLS and straight IPS addresses.

Monday, July 23, 2007 7:24:00 pm  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

The first lesson of spam is to NEVER take its contents at face value. Firstly, the "US-NMA" is not a real organisation--the REAL "NMA" really IS an association of Black doctors--it was formed in the 1800s when the AMA would only admit white doctors. The spammer deliberately chose the name (adding the US part) to make the email look more legitimate.

Second, the notorious business "My Canadian Pharmacy" has NOTHING TO DO with Canada at all. There is NO business in Canada registered under that name, either corporately or as a proprietorship. Upon investigation it appears that the "My Canadian Pharmacy" site operates out of Russia (or another former Soviet Republic).

The fraudulent "US NMA" site domains were all registered through a Chinese registrar, and appear to point to IP addresses in the DHCP range used by American cable companies (dynamically-assigned). This suggests that the websites that do the redirecting to "My Canadian Pharmacy" are actually infected Windows boxes in American homes (yet another unwitting victim).

So why do they call themselves "Canadian"? Because these people are targeting Americans with their spam. Chinese and Russian products and businesses of late are viewed with great distrust in the US (with tainted food, toothpaste and toys coming from China especially). Canadian pharmaceuticals are seen as quality products. Furthermore, in the US it is common knowledge that Canadian regulations make drugs much cheaper to buy than in the US, so those that live along the border often fill their prescriptions in Canada (it is legal and the products are safe). The spammers are taking advantage of Canada's reputation of having both cheap and safe pharmaceuticals.

Americans should know that pharmacies are pretty tightly controlled and that Americans generally CANNOT fill prescriptions online with Canadian pharmacies--they must be physically present in Canada to legally receive prescribed drugs. If you buy from an online "Canadian" pharmacy you are more likely buying from China or Russia and the drugs are likely fake.

The Canadian High Commission is well aware of the problem and is trying to work with international forces to stop the problem. However, since "My Canadian Pharmacy" is not a Canadian business it cannot do much more than it already is.

This spam is especially notorious because if you are unlucky enough to click on the link when the zombie servers are online it registers your email with their spam software, which pits your email in a list that literally gets 100 spam messages for every one that is sent out from the "unverified" list. Hope you weren't unlucky my friend...

Tuesday, August 14, 2007 4:07:00 pm  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

MAXIDEX WARNING

I had eye surgery and in the post-op pack was MAXIDEX(dexamethasone) drops by ALCON LABS.

Two days later I was BLIND

Use Google and enter EPOCRATES MAXIDEX to verify

Monday, August 25, 2008 7:06:00 pm  
Blogger James Miller said...

Anon. I shall delete your post later today, unless you put up a valid e-mail address. I have tried the verification and I can't find the post in Epocrates.

I will not put up accusations of this type without proof or e-mail addresses.

Monday, August 25, 2008 7:14:00 pm  

Post a Comment

<< Home