scottobear | 8331 - silly aim prank bots - "I say, old bean, have you seen my hat?" (Reply)

I keep getting hit by the aim bot that starts out with "i say, old bean, have you seen my hat?", usually aim user chewableputty.

An explanation of how the bot works is here.

Check out the google search - it seems to be happening to quite a few people.

The greathatsby bot scans LJ users for AIM screen names then sends two people the same message and relays their replies to each other so each person thinks the other person IMed them out of the blue.

Sort of a new version of the 3-way calling prank. I've gotten pings (even when invisible to aim) maybe once a week for the last 6 weeks. a nifty part of the trick is that it auto translates your im name to the bot name when you're in chat, too. so if you identify yourself as "I'm biglug23" it'll say to the other side "I'm chewableputty".

a way around it is to break it up with spaces or some other character - b'i'g'l'u'g'2'3'

other bot names -

chewableputty
thegreathatsby
bananahoedown
studbeefpile66
studleyqbeefpile
dirkfunk3000
dirkfunk5000
funkyplumber238
hatfact0ry
ofhatsandmen
scrubtron
iamscrubtron
scrubtronwashere
scrubtronics
octosausage
goatblaster16
greathatsby64
bananahootenanny