The internet firm Yahoo! has initiated legal proceedings against Yahoo! Lottery Spammers for sending out fraudulent mails that pretend to be from Yahoo! informing receivers that they have won a lottery. This is part of a scam for securing personal details from gullible web users.

Yahoo! Lottery Spammers’ email scam involves phishing that tries to lure internet users to divulge their credit card information, passwords, etc. This is done by clever mimicking of a legitimate communication from any renowned firm.
Yahoo’s senior vice-president (global intellectual property & business strategy), Joe Siino mentioned:

The unauthorised usage of our trademarks is fraudulent, misleading and has actually misled, deceived and also confused the public. Yahoo will not tolerate lottery hoax emails and will vigorously enforce its intellectual property rights.

The firm added in a public statement:

The spammers chose to willfully masquerade as Yahoo and then sent emails claiming that the recipient had won a prize, lottery or other award from Yahoo. We do not offer any such awards. Yahoo has no affiliation or any connection with the spammers or any of their email communications.