If you know that's an invalid IP address, you're probably less likely to fall for the scam after the scammer has put the setup work in. So if they filter you out before a scammer has to spend any actual effort on you, that means more time they can spend scamming people who might be more likely to fall for it

That's why these things often have egregious spelling errors and other seemingly obvious red flags

[–] zo0@programming.dev 74 points 6 days ago (2 children)

Just because I know what a valid IP is doesn't mean I'm not an idiot 😎

[–] toynbee@piefed.social 16 points 6 days ago (2 children)

Let's see you write a regex for one, then we'll decide.

[–] zitrone@europe.pub 2 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

lemme try

(25[0-5]|2[0-4][0-9]|1[0-9]{2}|[1-9]?[0-9])(\.(25[0-5]|2[0-4][0-9]|1[0-9]{2}|[1-9]?[0-9])){3}

tbh i have seen the stackoverflow solutions so i kinda know what i needed to do

this is entirely typed out from brain tho

[–] toynbee@piefed.social 1 points 1 day ago

I'm currently on my phone and I'm not going to try to figure out how to test regex on Graphene. Therefore I can only say: well done!

[–] JasonDJ@lemmy.zip 6 points 5 days ago

Why would anyone want to do that when there are dozens on stackoverflow?

[–] ulterno@programming.dev 3 points 6 days ago

That's not the probability they are looking for.

[–] DScratch@sh.itjust.works 49 points 6 days ago (1 children)

I do believe that is confirmed canon.

[–] entwine@programming.dev 2 points 5 days ago

I remember reading about this many years ago as an explanation for why there were so many banner ads that looked like they were created in MS paint.

[–] schnurrito@discuss.tchncs.de 17 points 6 days ago (1 children)

It's possible in general, but I don't think that's what's going on specifically here; not many people read IP addresses in such detail to notice such things at first glance.

[–] Cypher@aussie.zone 11 points 6 days ago

It’s exactly what is happening, they’re filtering out people who know what an IP address is and can contain so that they get fewer time wasters.

[–] teddypolice@feddit.org 15 points 6 days ago

Movies and TV shows actually do it this way to prevent actual machines getting group hugged.

Like in that one X-Files episode, where the Lone Gunmen hack into an invalid IP.

[–] sniggleboots@europe.pub 8 points 6 days ago

It's also why there's usually bad spelling or grammar in those e-mails as well

[–] SCmSTR@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 points 5 days ago

I never thought of it like that before. I wonder how common this intent actually is...