A RANDOM E-MAIL HAS LEFT A NAPANEE MAN LITERALLY SCARED FOR HIS LIFE.

THE E-MAIL, SENT TO HIM FROM AN UNKNOWN PERSON, CLAIMED A "HITMAN"WOULD COME AFTER HIM IF HE DID NOT REPLY

. ACCORDING TO THE O-P-P, THIS IS A POPULAR ON-LINE SCAM THAT GOES AFTER MONEY FROM THE FRIGHTENED RECIPIENTS.

NEWSWATCH'S MAEGEN KULCHAR REPORTS.

The internet is a powerful tool

.So powerful that one

Napanee man was too terrified to go on camera to speak about a threatening e-mail he received Thursday from an unknown person

. Jackie Perry:

"Its a very alarming email. The individual basically threatens basically that he has been hired to kill the individual"

The e-mail goes on to state that the person has offended someone and that for a lump sum of money he will identified who has hired him and in turn, not kill him.

A frightening piece of mail for anyone to receive but for the OPP, it's one they have seen many times.

Jackie Perry:

"This particular e-mail was a variation of the hitman scam,"

One of many scams, including romance scams, mailing fraudul

ent checks, false lottery winnings and many others now done over the Internet.

All of which police and the Canadian Anti-Fraud Centre have been aware for quite some time.

Daniel Williams/CAFC:

"There's a lot of scams on the

Internet where people are paying with their credit card and being defrauded"

Costing the victim, in some cases, large amounts of money.

Maegen Kulchar:

"The Canadian Anti-Fraud Centre says these types of scammers are not easy to catch, because most of them are organized crime, working thousands of miles away, making the success rate of finding them, very slim."

Daniel Williams/CAFC:

"The information that we gather is used to bust some gangs, but there's far more criminals out there doing mass marketing fraud"

To avoid becoming a victim police adviseyou to use

better judgement when receiving e-mails from people you don't know.

 Jackie Perry:

"Check with someone else if you get these types of things, check with another family member or a trusted friend, call the police".

Only one to five percent of fraud is reported to police and the Anti-Fraud Centre...a small number they

hope will increase to help put a stop to it

.Maegen Kulchar CKWS Newswatch Napanee.