Found it! https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/lifestyle/1997/08/09/a-web-of-lies/65db34c8-ea01-4c6d-9b6c-22d81157470d/?utm_term=.60382666f1c5
"A more elaborate and potentially more dangerous prank was recently played on 40 media executives, two journalists and Monty Python alum Eric Idle.
“The following accounts have reference numbers way out of sequence,” began the first, innocuous e-mail, ostensibly written by some guy named Denny Reikert from some corporation called Dysson. None of the recipients had heard of Dysson, and most replied in return e-mails that there had been some sort of mistake.
Apologetic and mysterious e-mails from Reikert followed, along with a note from Vicky DeBice, Dysson’s director of human resources, assuring that “Dysson does not buy or sell electronic address lists.” Later, DeBice sent another message: “For reasons yet to be understood, you received messages from one of our members, Denny Reikert. Denny Reikert was found dead yesterday afternoon.”
At this point several recipients, among them Microsoft exec Marty Behrens and MGM online producer Ken Locker, referred the incident to corporate security. But the story continued: Mendiero Barrett, Dysson’s vice president of Pan-Pacific Integration, announced a private inquiry into Reikert’s suicide; a corporate-looking Web site offered employee photos and client lists; an anonymous employee insisted that “Denny was no suicide.”
“By the time they asked if I wanted to take Denny Reikert’s position at the company, it seemed to stretch credibility,” said Locker, who was taken in by the hoax.
As the recipients were informed two weeks after the “on-line fiction” began, Dysson was the creation of LaFong – the team of Michael Kaplan and John Sanborn, who also created a CD-ROM called “Psychic Detective” and several other Web adventures.
Kaplan thought of the interactive idea after his wife, Susan, began accidentally receiving corporate e-mails from a company called Digital Cities. As the messages continued, Kaplan decided to indulge. “When a memo showed up asking that all recipients check Roger’s numbers before Friday’s presentation, I wrote back something like: Is it just me, or do Roger’s numbers look a bit padded in the 3rd quarter? Let’s confab ASAP.’ And I held my breath to see if there would be a reaction.”
https://archive.nytimes.com/www.nytimes.com/library/cyber/week/071997python.html
"The incident came to the public’s attention at the end of June, when Idle updated the site with a lengthy diatribe detailing an escalating series of very real e-mail exchanges he had had with denizens of the Dysson domain, whose Web site identifies itself as “a cooperative foundation” with 33,000 active members.
Idle said the first unsolicited message from Dysson arrived in his private e-mail account in mid-June, from a “member” named Denny Reikert. Idle informed him that the note had been sent to him in error.
What at first seemed like a minor mistake rapidly assumed more sinister overtones. After a few days and a few more messages about the e-mail mix-up from Reikert and Vicki DeBice, Dysson’s director of human resources, DeBice reported to Idle that Reikert had been found dead. She told Idle that he would probably be contacted by Dysson’s security force. Idle responded by sending DeBice his lawyer’s phone number.
Then Idle discovered Dysson’s Web site and its descriptions of its mission and activities – vaguely worded language that reads like a cross between a New Age cult’s recruitment brochure and a computer company’s annual report. As Idle mulled the site’s contents, he continued to receive e-mail messages from other Dysson members, including one asking if he would be interested in assuming some of Reikert’s responsibilities. With increasing annoyance, he continued to reply.
Beginning to sense a scam and reacting to his wife’s rising alarm, Idle called upon a security-consultant friend, who expressed certainty that the e-mail messages were no more than a prankster’s hoax and theorized that the same person was writing all of them.
Although Idle says he has never been bothered by stalkers, he adds: "You have to be aware. People get strange obsessions. Luckily, if you’re a comedian, by and large they either want to tell you a joke or sell you a script.
“In threat assessment, the first step is to see whether these people are harmful or not. My friend thought they were intrusive but not harmful, and then I relaxed. As soon as I knew that, I felt I could play with them back.”
Which he did, briefly. Then, deciding that enough was enough, he wrote, “Please go away and leave me alone.” Instead, he was e-mailed a password and was invited to register on the Dysson site. Idle entered the password-protected area of the site, determined it was a “feeble” joke and departed.
But as Idle recounts on PythOnline, only after writing as “Detective Mark Thomson” and raising the specter of a lawsuit did his correspondents finally divulge their motives.
“You were pitched,” the message to Idle admitted."