Remember the Nigerian scam messages way back when? Perhaps not so much way back when but quite awhile ago and still on occasion coming into my junk mail folder.

Scams are annoying, fear mongering, and down right rude. In 10 email scams to watch out for, Debra Shinder explains what you should watch out for to avoid being ‘duped’.

Some of the scams to watch for are “friend” messages in Facebook. In the ‘to’ field it should show your name, not ‘undisclosed recipient’. Fear mongering messages are just that, and should be read with a grain of salt if read for the first time in an e-mail message. The most popular fear message right now has to do with the H1N1 Flu, in that it is wiping out entire villages in Asia. Should that be true it would definitely make national headlines.

Another good scam is ‘your account is about to be canceled or closed’. A clue that it is a scam is these messages often have grammatical errors.

The best one of all is ‘You’re A Winner’. How many times have I heard that? And in order to claim my ‘prize’ I need to send all my account and personal information. Should the contest be legitimate, there will always be alternative ways to send your information and a way to confirm you really are a winner.

Debra offered some good tips on the art of watching for scams.