Scam email I wrote about last week is part of an ongoing campaign

Apparently the scam email I wrote about last week is part of an ongoing campaign. I received another one yesterday (alt text for this screenshot is below):

This email gets one thing correct that the last email I posted about got wrong: the signature image is actually linked to the sender’s “blinq.me” card, so if you click on any of the fake buttons in the footer it will actually take you there. Screenshot in case it gets deleted:

It looks like Billy Palmieri really is a recruiter at NVIDIA, but the sender of this message definitely isn’t him.

There are oddities here. Why did the scammer put Palmieri’s real NVIDIA email address in the signature and on the Blinq card? Did he do that to make it look more authentic, and he’s hoping that some people will reply to the email (and therefore send their reply to the scammer’s Gmail inbox) rather than the NVIDIA address?

Or does the scammer not actually care if people reply to the email? Perhaps this is just about the tracking images in the email, to find out which recipients actually open the email?

Or perhaps the scam is being perpetrated by Blinq and the purpose is to collect people’s personal information? When you click the “Save contact” button it displays a QR code and a “Receive via Email” button, and of course you have to provide Blinq with your email address to receive it via email. This theory doesn’t seem particularly likely to me, since the scammer already has my name and email address, but it really is a mystery what’s going on.

Maybe I’ll reply to the email and see what happens.

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Alt text for email screenshot above:

Screenshot of email from “Billy Palmieri <billy.palmieri.sr.recruit.nvidia@gmail.com>” to me. Subject is “Information Security Leadership & Cybersecurity Transformation Opportunities”. The DKIM line in the header says it’s got valid DKIM info for gmail.com.

The body of the email reads as follows:

Hi Jonathan,

I came across your profile and was impressed by your extensive leadership across information security, particularly your hands-on experience building and operating security programs in highly sensitive, large-scale environments such as VA.gov and enterprise SaaS platforms. Your ability to design and run effective security programs while balancing engineering realities, compliance requirements, and operational delivery stands out.

I’m a Sr. Recruiter at NVIDIA, partnering with leaders driving AI-enabled enterprise transformation, secure platform engineering, and next-generation cybersecurity architecture across complex and regulated environments.

Based on your background, I see strong alignment with roles such as Information Security Leadership (Head of Security / Director / CISO-track), Federal & Public Sector Security Program Leadership, Cloud Security & Security Architecture Lead, Security Engineering & Platform Protection Leadership, and Fractional / Advisory CISO opportunities.

Would you be open to a brief conversation to explore alignment?

Below that is a signature which has on the left a photo of the supposed sender and below that an NVIDIA logo. To the right it says:

Billy Palmieri
Senior Talent Strategist / Executive Recruiter
NVIDIA
Driving executive and technical talent strategy at NVIDIA | 20+ years scaling high-impact teams across Silicon Valley’s most innovative companies
[round email icon] b. palmieri@nvidia.com / Work
[round unrecognizable icon] Visit our website
[round map pin icon] Bainbridge Island, Washington, United States / Work Address
[LinkedIn icon] [Facebook icon] [Button that says “Save contact”]