Scamming Exposed!
An x-ray of the activities of cyber fruadsters
FOREWORD
The present world in which we live has become amazingly sophisticated and technologically advanced. It is a scientific and technocratic world, an age of computers, internet browsing, space exploration, genetic engineering, and so on. Thanks to the ever rapid evolvement and development of information and communication technology, computer literacy is no longer taken for granted; it has become a sine qua none for those who want to remain relevant. Those seeking employment whether in private or public sectors are always asked if they are computer literate. Lack of computer literacy is often a serious setback for those who otherwise would have gone some steps higher than they are. Microsoft word, browsing, Google, e-mail, chatting, face book, twitters, scam, spam, etc are some of the common jargons that fill the computerized air which we breathe on daily basis.
In as much as the invention of computer with its corresponding internet possibility has brought with it a lot of positive changes and impacts on our life individually and collectively, the wrong or bad use of it has also brought a lot of disadvantages to individuals and corporate bodies the world over. Through the internet many people have become “hard currency” billionaires at the expense of numerous individuals and corporate bodies who have been tricked into huge financial loses no thanks to fake internet business transactions technically referred to as scamming. The scam guys or swindlers are ever ready with brand new ways of luring their unfortunate victims into believing their confidence tricks through fake cyber transactions. In the course of such fake transactions, various things have happened to various victims, ranging from heartbreak to kidnapping, psychological derangement, and even death. It is important that people be educated on internet scamming so that they get to know about this cankerworm that has invaded the cyber super high way. This is what Denis Edim has masterfully done in his book Scamming Exposed!
In this interesting and well documented piece of work Edim has successfully exposed the tricks behind scamming and the nefarious activities of those behind this multibillion dollar internet business deal. The author strikes an important note to victims and would be victims of internet fraud by noting that scammers succeed by exploiting some basic manifestations of the human psyche, such as greed, honesty, dishonesty, compassion, vanity, irresponsibility, credulity, overconfidence, naiveté, etc. Depending on the nature and magnitude of the scam and the method or approach deployed by the cyber swindlers, scamming has been categorized as 419 fraud, the Spanish prisoner, bank scam, black money scam, Russian or Ukrainian scam, Nigerian scam, and so on. Giving a brief overview of scamming activities, the author notes that some scams are professionally organized, especially in the United Kingdom, Spain, Nigeria, Malaysia and other parts of the world, having offices with functional websites, e-mail addresses, telephone and fax numbers and a wide network of connections, sometimes even with government.
In easy and simple-to-read English the author describes in a very comprehensive manner the various versions of scamming. Among the most notable ones are romance scam, lottery scam, black dollar-black money scam, inheritance scam, charity scam, cheque cashing scam, fraud recovery scam, bomb scam, babysitting scam, pet scam, rental scam, and attorney collection scam. The consequences of these scams are well documented, serving as warnings and danger signals to would be victims of this costly cyber business. The author also takes a serious look at the religious aspect of scamming, a phenomenon whereby scammers pose as ministers, bishops, priests, pastors, deacons or religious workers to defraud people. Practical examples of how religious scammers operate are also well documented.
I am really excited about this unique piece of work which, I can vouch, will open the eyes of many people to the nefarious activities of scammers. Reading through the book has actually opened my eyes to the fact that what I knew about cyber scam was merely a tip of the iceberg. The author’s warning as a means of checking this cankerworm is timely, namely that we should be alert, look before we leap, eschew greed, irresponsibility, quick trust, credulity and know that all that glitters is not gold. Therefore one should be careful not to be a mugu so as not to fall easy prey to the confidence game of the scammers. No one will regret ever having read this wonderful volume!
Rev. Dr. Donatus Udoette
Department of Religious and Cultural Studies
University of Uyo – Uyo, Akwa Ibom State
Nigeria
DISCLAIMER
While this book presumes neither to speak authoritatively about the effect of the scam on North Americans, Europeans, Asians, Africans or Australians, nor to advise governments, the comments so presented in this book, points to the fact that scamming hurts the reputation of legitimate national and international businessmen among people who have no other knowledge of, for example, West African society. Government officials and legitimate business people of Africa, in particular, and the world in general must be steaming mad. The relatively few scam artists cast a shadow of suspicion over many business dealings. Africa, for instance, is a continent rich in resources with a tremendous history, yet scamming has made it difficult to explore this sector for the much needed foreign exchange.
Some of the scams play on the victims' greed, but many play on victim's financial neediness, altruism or religious feelings. The specifically business-related scams entice small to mid-sized business people or faith-based organizations to pay advance fees to bid on non-existent contracts, or to give money to pay fees associated with moving money to their bank account. The religious scams, sprinkled with a lot of references to God and church work, prey especially on faith-based organizations.
Perhaps (let us hope) a future Africa, tranquil and prosperous, will see fewer of these frustrated novelists-in-crime -- their literary talents will have found other legitimate avenues by which to profit. We love Africa and I love Africans and I appreciate the fact that I am from Africa (Nigeria). Nothing here should be taken as a criticism of any nation or people, nor do I suggest that there are no scam artists in other countries.
By the way, "maga" or "mugu" two of the words scam artists use when talking about their victims are derived from Igbo language in Nigeria. Not flattering terms! Don't be a mugu. I hope and pray that you will not fall prey to their many variations of the confidence game. This book is a chronicle of many writings that is scattered all over the internet. This is an honest labour and of sincerity to expose the tricks of scammers and promote transparency and integrity in cyber operations. It comes from a true heart of love for humanity irrespective of colour, race or continent.
This book is by no means a fabrication of my own imagination. These are supported by factual accounts of real life people from reputable websites, magazines, journals, individuals etc. the reader is free to form his own conclusion to accept or neglect whatever is said. The author is in no way bound to take responsibility of any consequencies resulting from this text.
CONTENTS
Disclaimer
Section One
Introduction - - - - - - - - 6
Spam - - - -- - - - -- - 8
Identity theft - - - - - - - - 11
A Historical Review - - - - - - - 12
An Overview of Scamming Activities - - - - - 14
The Diverse Strategies of the Scams - - - - - 26
Section Two
Common Versions - - - - - - - 30
Romance scam - - - - - - - - 31
Lottery Scam - - - - - - - - 44
Black Dollar – Black Money Scam - - - - - 65
Inheritance Scam - - - - - - - 77
Charity Scam - - - - - - - 104
Fake Employment Offer - - - - - - 111
Check Cashing Scam - - - - - - - 123
Other Scams - - - - - - - - 134
SECTION THREE
Consequences - - - - - - - - 141
Monetary loss Estimates - - - - - - 142
Physical harm or death - - - - - - - 144
Kidnapping - - - - - - - - 145
Murder - - - - - - - - 146
Emotional harm - - - - - - - 147
Arrests - - - - - - - - 148
Victim becomes criminal - - - - - - 150
SECTION FOUR
Interview with Scammer and Scamming News - - - 152
Interviews - - - - - - - - 153
Scamming News - - - - - - - 171
SECTION FIVE
Sample Letters and Fake emails - - - - 196
Romance Angle - - - - - - - 197
Religious Angle - - - - - - - 314
Lottery, Business, Inheritance and Charity Angle - - 371
Some fake Emails use by Scammers - - - - 402
Terms Used By 419 Scammers - - - - - 491
REFERENCES - - - - - - - 493
SECTION
I
Introduction
The growth of technology has changed the way in which companies do business and has opened up new information sources. However, it has also created new opportunities for conmen and fraudsters to take advantage of business transactions.
Scamming or advance-fee fraud is a confidence trick in which the target is persuaded to advance sums of money in the hope of realizing a significantly larger gain. A confidence trick or confidence game (also known as a bunko, con, flim flam, gaffle, grift, hustle, scam, scheme, guy, swindle or bamboozle. Refer to the appendix for the terms used by scammers) is an attempt to defraud a person or group by gaining their confidence. The victim is known as the mark or mogu, the trickster is called a confidence man, con man, confidence trickster, guy man, grifter, or con artist, and any accomplices are known as shills or guy. Confidence men or women exploit characteristics of the human psyche such as greed, both dishonesty and honesty, vanity, compassion, credulity, irresponsibility, naïveté, and the thought of trying to get something of value for nothing or for something far less valuable. Confidence men or women have victimized individuals from all walks of life. Confidence tricks exploit typical human qualities such as greed, dishonesty, vanity, honesty, compassion, credulity, irresponsibility and naïveté. The common factor is that the victim (mark) relies on the good faith of the con artist.
Just as there is no typical profile for swindlers, neither is there one for their victims. Virtually anyone can fall prey to fraudulent crimes. Certainly victims of high-yield investment frauds may possess a level of greed which exceeds their caution as well as a willingness to believe what they want to believe. However, not all fraud victims are greedy, risk-taking, self-deceptive individuals looking to make a quick dollar. Nor are all fraud victims naïve, uneducated, or elderly.
A greedy or dishonest mark may attempt to out-cheat the con artist, only to discover that he or she has been manipulated into losing from the very beginning. This is such a general principle in scamming that there is a saying among con men that "you can't cheat an honest man."
Shills, also known as accomplices, help manipulate the mark into accepting the con man's plan. In a traditional scamming, the mark is led to believe that he will be able to win money or some other prize by doing some task. The accomplices may pretend to be strangers who have benefited from performing the task in the past.
Among the variations on this type of scam are the Nigerian Letter (also called the 419 fraud, the Spanish Prisoner, Nigerian scam, bank scam, or money offer, the black money scam as well as Russian/Ukrainian scam. The so-called Russian and Nigerian scams stand for wholly dissimilar organized-crime traditions; they therefore tend to use altogether different breeds of approaches.
Since most of the scamming activities (not all) begin with a victim receiving an unsolicited e-mail and goes on till they are being swindled of thousands and sometimes millions of dollar, I want to start by briefly writing about this unsolicited e-mail technically known as spam and identity theft to enable to further understand the secret behind this trick.
SPAM
If you encounter your e-mail "Inbox" flooded by messages, which comes from anonymous sources, this is considered a spam. When you click on the spams you will find that the subject lines are often misleading, and you find advertisements or misleading
information to get you to click links to websites.
Worse, sometimes you find requests for credit card information
or eBay passwords which look genuine, but are in fact efforts to steal your personal financial information.
What is spam?
The term spam refers to submitting the same message to a large group of individuals in an effort to force the message onto people who would otherwise choose not to receive this message.
E-mail spam, also known as junk e-mail or unsolicited bulk e-mail (UBE), is a subset of spam that involves nearly identical messages sent to numerous recipients by e-mail. Definitions of spam usually include the aspects that e-mail is unsolicited and sent in bulk. One subset of UBE is UCE (unsolicited commercial e-mail).
E-mail spam has steadily grown since the early 1990s. Botnets, networks of virus-infected computers, are used to send about 80% of spam. Since the cost of the spam is borne mostly by the recipient, it is effectively postage due for advertising.
What are the legal impedements of spam?
The legal status of spam varies from one jurisdiction to another. In the United States, spam was declared to be legal by the CAN-SPAM Act of 2003 provided the message adheres to certain specifications. ISPs have attempted to recover the cost of spam through lawsuits against spammers, although they have been mostly unsuccessful in collecting damages despite winning in court.
How can spammers access your e-mail?
The simplest method involves spammers purchasing or trading lists of e-mail addresses from other spammers. Another common method is the use of special software known as "harvesting bots" or "harvesters", which spider Web pages, postings on Usenet, mailing list archives, internet forums and other online sources to obtain e-mail addresses from public data.
Spammers may also use a form of dictionary attack in order to harvest e-mail addresses, known as a directory harvest attack, where valid e-mail addresses at a specific domain are found by guessing e-mail address using common usernames in email addresses at that domain. For example, trying alan@example.com, alana@example.com, alanb@example.com, etc. and any that are accepted for delivery by the recipient email server, instead of rejected, are added to the list of theoretically valid e-mail addresses for that domain.
Another method of e-mail address harvesting is to offer a product or service free of charge as long as the user provides a valid e-mail address, and then use the addresses collected from users as spam targets. Common products and services offered are jokes of the day, daily bible quotes, news or stock alerts, free merchandise, or even registered sex offender alerts for one's area. Another technique was used in late 2007 by the company iDate, which used e-mail harvesting directed at subscribers to the Quechup website to spam the victim's friends and contacts.
Spammers may harvest e-mail addresses from a number of sources. A popular method uses e-mail addresses which their owners have published for other purposes. Usenet posts, especially those in archives such as Google Groups, frequently yield addresses. Simply searching the Web for pages with addresses — such as corporate staff directories or membership lists of professional societies — using spambots can yield thousands of addresses, most of them deliverable. Spammers have also subscribed to discussion mailing lists for the purpose of gathering the addresses of posters. The DNS and WHOIS systems require the publication of technical contact information for all Internet domains; spammers have illegally trawled these resources for email addresses. Many spammers use programs called web spiders to find email addresses on web pages.
What are the Techniques of the Spammers to Scam?
Spammers frequently seek out and make use of vulnerable third-party systems such as open mail relays and open proxy servers. SMTP forwards mail from one server to another—mail servers that ISPs run commonly require some form of authentication to ensure that the user is a customer of that ISP. Open relays, however, do not properly check who is using the mail server and pass all mail to the destination address, making it harder to track down spammers.
Increasingly, spammers use networks of malware-infected PCs (zombies) to send their spam. Zombie networks are also known as Botnets (such zombifying malware is known as a bot, short for robot). In June 2006, an estimated 80% of e-mail spam was sent by zombie PCs, an increase of 30% from the prior year. Estimated 55 billion e-mail spams were sent each day in June 2006, an increase of 25 billion per day from June 2005.
For Q1 2010, an estimated 305,000 newly activated zombie PCs were brought online each day for malicious activity. This number is slightly lower than the 312,000 of Q4 2009.
Brazil produced the most zombies in the first quarter of 2010. Brazil was the source of 20% of all zombies, which is down from 14% from the fourth quarter 2009. India had 10%, with Vietnam at 8%, and the Russian Federation at 7%.
IDENTITY THEFT
Identity theft involves fraudsters/scammers obtaining sufficient information about a person to be able to assume their identity and obtain goods, credit or services under the falsely assumed identity. Identity theft is quite widespread and can cause enormous problems to their victims who have stolen identity.
Security
Policy
As
part of your security policy, you should implement the following
guidelines on what personal information should
not be
divulged to third parties, particularly by electronic means - such
as email. Learn
to:
• keep
personal or financial details out of emails
• only
open emails from trusted parties
• report
suspicious emails to the appropriate authorities
Identity theft can occur in the business world as well. If a fraudster can get enough information about a business, they may be able to apply for a corporate credit or debit card and go on an electronic spending spree.
In recent years, fraudsters have been stealing entire corporate identities in a scam known as 'company hijacking' - a fraud that costs an estimated £50 million a year.
Historical Review
The first known usage of the term "confidence man" in English was in 1849; it was used by American press during the United States trial of William Thompson. Thompson chatted with strangers until he asked if they had the confidence to lend him their watches, whereupon he would walk off with the watch; he was captured when a victim recognized him on the street. Although similar to older scams such as the Spanish Prisoner, the modern 419 scam originated in the early 1980s as the oil-based Nigerian economy declined. Several unemployed university students first used this scam as a means of manipulating business visitors interested in shady deals in the Nigerian oil sector before targeting businessmen in the west, and later the wider population. Scammers in the early-to-mid 1990s targeted companies, sending scam messages via letter, fax, or Telex. The spread of e-mail and easy access to e-mail-harvesting software significantly lowered the cost of sending scam letters by using the Internet. In the 2000s, the 419 scam has spurred imitations from other locations in Africa, Philippines, Malaysia, Russia, Australia, Canada, United Kingdom, and the United States. In particular advanced fee fraud in the United States primarily originates from the cities of Buffalo and Detroit.
The number "419" refers to the article of the Nigerian Criminal Code (part of Chapter 38: "Obtaining Property by false pretences; Cheating") dealing with fraud. The American Dialect Society has traced the term "419 fraud" back to 1992.
The advance-fee fraud is similar to a much older scam known as the Spanish Prisoner scam in which the trickster tells the victim that a rich prisoner promised to share treasure with the victim in exchange for money to bribe prison guards. An older version of this scam existed by the end of 18th century, and is called "The Letter From Jerusalem" by Eugène François Vidocq, in his memoirs.
Insa Nolte, a lecturer of University of Birmingham's African Studies Department, stated that "The availability of e-mail helped to transform a local form of fraud into one of Nigeria's most important export industries”. Embassies and other organizations warn visitors to various countries about 419. Countries in West Africa with warnings cited include Nigeria, Ghana, Benin, Côte d'Ivoire (Ivory Coast), Togo, Senegal and Burkina Faso. Countries outside West Africa with 419 warnings cited include South Africa, Spain, and the Netherlands, to mention but a few.
An Overview of Scamming Activities
This scam usually begins with a letter or e-mail purportedly sent to a selected recipient but actually sent to many, to make an offer that would result in a romance dream come true or large payoff for the victim. The e-mail's subject line often says something like "From the desk of Barrister. [Name]", "Your assistance is needed", and so on.
The details vary, but the usual story is that a person, often government or bank employee, knows of a large amount of unclaimed money or gold which he cannot access directly, usually because he has no right to it. Such people, who may be real but impersonated people or fictitious characters played by the con artist, could include the wife or son of a deposed African or Indonesian leader or dictator who has amassed a stolen fortune, or a bank employee who knows of a terminally ill wealthy person with no relatives or a wealthy foreigner who deposited money in the bank just before dying in a plane crash (leaving no will or known next of kin), a US soldier who has stumbled upon a hidden cache of gold in Iraq, a business being audited by the government, a disgruntled worker or corrupt government official who has embezzled funds, a refugee, and similar characters. The money could be in the form of gold bullion, gold dust, money in a bank account, blood diamonds, a series of cheques or bank drafts, and so forth. The sums involved are usually in the millions of dollars, and the investor is promised a large share, typically ten to forty percent, if they assist the scam character in retrieving the money. Whilst the vast majority of recipients do not respond to these e-mails, a very small percentage do, enough to make the fraud worthwhile as many millions of messages can be sent. Invariably sums of money which are substantial, but very much smaller than the promised profits, are said to be required in advance for bribes, fees, etc.—this is the money being stolen from the victim, who thinks he or she is investing to make a huge profit.
Many operations are professionally organized in Malaysia, UK, Spain, and many African countries mostly in Nigeria, with offices, working fax numbers, and often contacts at government offices. The victim who attempts to research the background of the offer often finds that all pieces fit together. Such scammers can often lure wealthy investors, investment groups, or other business entities into scams resulting in multi-million dollar losses. However, many scammers are part of less organized gangs or are operating independently; such scammers have reduced access to the above connections and thus have little success with wealthier investors or business entities attempting to research them, but are still convincing to middle-class individuals and small businesses, and can deceive hundreds of thousands of dollars from such victims.
If the victim agrees to the deal, the other side often sends one or more false documents bearing official government stamps, and seals. Scammers often mention false addresses and use photographs taken from the Internet or from magazines to falsely represent themselves. Often a photograph used by a scammer is not of any person involved in the scheme. Multiple "people" involved in schemes are fictitious; the author of the "West African Advance Fee Scams" article posted on the website of the Embassy of the United States in Abidjan, Côte d'Ivoire believes that in many cases one person controls many fictitious personas used in scams. Check inheritance scam for detail of this type of scam.
A scammer introduces a delay or monetary hurdle that prevents the deal from occurring as planned, such as "To transmit the money, we need to bribe a bank official. Could you help us with a loan?" or "For you to be a party to the transaction, you must have holdings in a bank of particular country to the tune of $100,000 or more" or similar. More delays and more additional costs are added, always keeping the promise of an imminent large transfer alive, convincing the victim that the money they are currently paying is covered several times over by the payoff. Sometimes psychological pressure is added by claiming that the African side, to pay certain fees, had to sell belongings and borrow money on their house or by pointing out the different salary scale and living conditions in Africa, compared to the West.
Much of the time, however, the needed psychological pressure is self-applied; once the victims have put money in toward the payoff, they feel they have a vested interest in seeing the "deal" through. Some victims believe that they can cheat the con artist. This idea is often encouraged by the fraudsters who write in a clumsy and uneducated style which presents them as naive and easily cheated by a sophisticated Westerner.
The essential fact in all advance-fee fraud operations is that the promised money transfer never happens because the money or gold does not exist. The perpetrators rely on the fact that, by the time the victim realizes this (often only after being confronted by a third party who has noticed the transactions or conversation and recognized the scam), the victim may have sent thousands of dollars of their own money, and sometimes thousands or millions more that has been borrowed or stolen, to the scammer via an untraceable and/or irreversible means such as wire transfer.
In extreme cases the victim may not realize that he or she has been defrauded. A version of the scam is for the thief to claim to have contacts to facilitate legitimate business loans; the victim here is not persuaded that he is doing anything illegal. The fraudster meets the victim, and must be able to act the part of a well-connected and experienced loan broker. He asks for payment in advance, which is normal for large loans. Then the loan gradually falls through in a plausible way, and the victim may end up being defrauded of tens of thousands of dollars or pounds, thinking only that the deal simply failed. These frauds may go unreported, either because the victim does not realize he has been cheated, or due to reluctance to admit the facts. Because of "non-disclosure clauses" which may have been included in the fraudulent contract, reporting of the scam may be delayed until the victim becomes certain he has been cheated.
The spam e-mails perpetrating these scams are often sent from Internet cafés equipped with satellite Internet. Recipient addresses and e-mail content are copied and pasted into a webmail interface using a standalone storage medium, such as a memory card.
Nigeria also contains many businesses that provide false documents used in scams; after a scam involving a forged signature of Nigerian former President Olusegun Obasanjo in summer 2005, Nigerian authorities raided a market in the Oluwole section of Lagos. The police seized thousands of Nigerian and non-Nigerian passports, 10,000 blank British Airways boarding passes, 10,000 United States money orders, customs documents, false university certificates, 500 printing plates, and 500 computers. During the courses of many schemes, scammers ask victims to supply bank account information. Usually this is a "test" devised by the scammer to gauge the victim's gullibility.
Scammers often request that payments be made using a wire transfer service like Western Union and Moneygram. The reason given by the scammer usually relates to the speed at which the payment can be received and processed, allowing quick release of the supposed payoff. The real reason is that wire transfers and similar methods of payment are irreversible, untraceable and, because identification beyond knowledge of the details of the transaction is often not required, completely anonymous.
Telephone numbers used by scammers tend to come from mobile phones. In Côte d'Ivoire (Ivory Coast) a scammer may purchase an inexpensive mobile phone and a pre-paid SIM card without submitting subscriber information. If the scammers believed they are being traced, they discard their mobile phones and purchase new ones. In Malaysia, scammers purchase UK SIM card with recharge cards or sometimes uses redtone recharge voucher to load their phone to make calls knowing fully well that with redtone their phone number will not be displayed hence, they can claim to be in any part of the world.
Some crime syndicates employ fraudsters in the United States who conclude "deals" or threaten victims who try to leave deals. Such events are accounted as follows:
The scam artists always begin with an urgent tone and a specific deadline. "We will have the money wired within 7 working days, so we must act quickly" or "I must have this transaction completed by the end of the month before such and such happens. I will do my part and I will be depending upon you to do your part. Remember this is a business transaction..."
Scammers will use compliments and flattery to lull you into a false sense of security. Some will use a tragic situation to make you feel sorry for them. "I just got out of the hospital for a liver condition". One woman pleaded with me. All she needed was $890 to pay for a kidney operation for her son. An obvious scam. (Where can one get an operation like that for such a bargain?) It is always about the money they can extract rom you, in whatever manner they can do it. Playing on your sympathies is just one of the gambits.
The letters are generally sent by a supposed Prince, a Chief, a Dr., wife of a General, a Barrister, Solicitor, Lawyer or a Bank Official. Or the letter writer is the relative of a supposed prince, a Chief, a Dr... . Well, you get the picture.
They will want everything to be kept confidential. Lies and greed are cousins. And these lies breed in the dark. They want to isolate you. Strict secrecy. They do not want you to talk to a lawyer, financial advisor, relative, business partner or spouse. Plus, if the truth be known, you do not want to talk to anyone else either, because deep down you know that something just is not right and you feel a bit giddy thinking that this just might be real. Greed or need has kicked in and you are blinded, hoping against hope that the business proposal is true.
Some victims are so secretive that they give retirement money to the scam artist and their spouse does not know what has happened -- until it's too late.
Everything about the business proposal is said to be "safe and reliable". So scammers gave assurance that their transactions are "100% Risk Free".
Guilt and shame are the main tools used by scam artists. Scam artists set the tone by calling the business proposal a "partnership". They will try to use this "guilt tool" when sharing how much they have done on their end to make the business transaction work. He sold his car. He mortgaged his home. He took a large loan from a dear friend. Of course, none of this is verifiable. But these stories are designed to tug at your heart strings and designed to make you feel guilty hoping that this will be the way he can get you to do your part in the partnership -- give him some of your hard earned money. Tell him that you need to call your travel agent to book a "guilt trip".
Scam artists would love for you to travel to their home turf. Once you're there the "bait and switch" happens. Extenuating circumstances and delays cause them to demand the payment of more money from you before the millions of dollars can be released into your account ("The government didn't inform us of the need for a particular document, which costs an additional $3000"). You pay and then wait and wait, until you run out of money or patience. They figure that since you have already paid a lot of money to get to Nigeria, Ghana, Togo, Malaysia, Philippines, Atlanta, Dallas, London, Amsterdam, Spain, or Toronto -- you will probably call back home and convince wife, uncle, brother or sister to wire you a few thousand dollars to take care of the final document. And, of course, you'll promise wife, uncle, brother or sister that you'll give him or her double or triple his money once you are fabulously wealthy!
They will sprinkle religious content in their emails and phone calls -- "I know that we will need $2000 to pay for a particular document, but my pastor told me that he will take care of that fee." -- "I am confident that God has brought us together." -- "As a Christian, I want to make sure that..." -- "May God bless you and your family" -- "May Allah be with you" -- "You can receive these funds as long as you will remain honest to me till the end for this important business trusting in you and believing in God that you will never let me down either now or in future." Refer to sample emails for quite a few "religious" scams.
They will probably make the first 2-3 minute telephone call to establish contact, but then will want you to initiate the rest of the calls. Generally these scam artists have a pay-per-minute cell phone that is used for their scams. Once you get them on the line they will use their verbal skills for as long as you let them -- with gusts up to 120 mph. It has been reported by some victims that they have racked up quite a telephone bill before realizing that they have been engaged in a fraudulent business proposal.
If the scam artists get you to travel to Africa or any part of the world, you will be fortunate to leave alive. There are a few horror stories of businessmen being picked up at the airport and then found dead a few miles away. (In the summer of 1995, an American businessman was found murdered not far from the airport in Lagos. Numerous missing-people on business trip reports have been filed over the past decades.)
You receive a 419 scam letter from a woman (Mariam Abacha, Dorie Kabila, etc.). Guess what -- it is really a man. Probably 99.7% of all scam artists are men. But if you do decide to go over to meet them, they will have a well-dressed woman who will meet you at a restaurant posing as the woman in the emails. Whenever you read an email from a woman, picture a man on a computer somewhere in Africa, Asia or Europe typing with a grin on his face.
If you travel to the scam artists in West Africa or South Africa there are chances that you will be kidnapped for ransom. They can arrange for a bribed government official to take your passport. It is not beyond the police jurisdiction to participate in this illegal activity. You aren't going back home until you pay a "gratuity" or "processing fee" to get your passport returned or worse they might execute you.
Remember that the average monthly wage for someone in West Africa is between $150 to $300 a month. Keep this in mind as they work you down from needing $100,000 to $50,000. When you continue to resist, you will be amazed as to how they suddenly find some of the money, but they still need $20000. You still resist. A few days later they have "trusted" you so much that they sold the family vehicle for $12500, but they still needed $7500. You still resist. They somehow have obtained $5000, but still need $2500 . The point of all this is that if they can get any amount of money, they have succeeded. By the way, everything is relative -- $2500 takes care of their monthly bills for about 10 months. And that's the name of the game: Lure you in to give them some money. Any amount will do. Research has it that "multi-million dollar deals" are sometimes stopped because of the lack of $200 to complete the final arrangement.
They would love to have you send your money by Western Union to the attention of another name (identity), which may or may not be his/her real name. Try mentioning that you will wire to a legitimate bank and you will hear a story about how no one at the bank can know that he/she is receiving money from overseas, because then the government will suspect them of having the undeclared money they are trying to give to you. "And you wouldn't want that to happen to mess up our business arrangement, would you?" They make this story sound very convincing!
The documents they put together are often stunningly real! They have the national seals and logos, the colors and the official-looking signatures. The fake passports are very real-looking. Like I always say if scam artists were to put their energy into something legal, they could be a credit to the international business community and ultimately world's economy. The action of scam artists castes a bad light on all legitimate businesses. How many millions (billions?) of dollars have not been invested in Africa simply because of the 419 frauds and scams? But sometimes the documents look like they were created by a pre-teenager. These particular documents are designed by small-time players trying to get into the scamming game.
Bribed government officials are often involved. Sometimes they will even use the offices of actual government buildings. Imagine the money that has to be paid for this kind of elite treatment!
Some teams of scam artists have actual offices in some main cities in North America like Toronto, Atlanta or Dallas. They will also try to lure you to some of the international financial headquarters like London, Amsterdam or Spain. They will have "team members" in these specific cities who will act as an "intermediary" or "clearing house" to finalize the transaction deal with you when you arrive. And they always have some delay or need some final document before the funds can be released. They play the "good cop" / "bad cop" routine to perfection. Your initial contact plays dumb, stating that he has no understanding of or control over what the person at the "financial center" needs from you. You get the distinct sense, however, that after dealing with you, they all get on a conference call, laughing about how stupid you are and then discussing their next move.
As said in the previous point, everyone with whom you talk and/or meet is working together as a team to scam you. They play off each other while pretending that they did not know each other. The main contact turns you over to a person at a finance center in Amsterdam, let's say. That person in Amsterdam declares that he needs a particular document. It is as predictable as the law of gravity. You then go back to your main contact and he turns you over to someone else who is willing to get someone he knows in the government who will do him and you a special favor -- for a very special fee. Guess who will be required to pay that "special fee"?
The scam artist will ultimately ask for your bank account number. Some account numbers are used for future scams. We know of one person who over time received well over $300,000 in actual bogus checks. I mean, these checks were real! You could see the watermarks as they were held up to the light. One check was even from a federal bankruptcy account.
Here's
the scam: They will send you a "good
faith" $35,000 check, asking you to wire about $30,000 from
that check to an overseas account to ostensibly pay for the document
fees. You are told to keep $5,000 of the $35,000 check to cover all
your phone and fax bills. You are "smart"
-- before you cash the $35,000 check, you make a few phone calls and
are told that it is a real account and there is enough money to
cover everything. You are amazed and your confidence in your contact
is bolstered. You cash it, waiting 48 hours for the dust to settle.
And then you wire $30,000 to the account. Next thing you know that
FBI is knocking on your door. The cheque you cashed was a real check
with real money from a real account -- except the money was not
legally his to give. Guess who has $30,000 in his account? Your
scamming contact. Guess who's left holding the legal bag? Do you
want go to jail? Just send and spend the money from the cashed check
given to you by your scam artist friend. That will put you in deep
doo doo.
A variation to the above scam is that they will tell you to go check with your bank. "The money has been sent. It's waiting for you." When you call the bank, someone will say that they have received a fax which states that the, let's say, $18 Million is to be sent to the account. You are put off by the lack of money in your account. You then email or call the scam artist and he will play dumb telling you to call his "brokerage firm" to check on the progress being made. You call the "brokerage firm" and that guy will tell you that he knows nothing except that the money was sent with a hold on it until you send him a 1% fee for his service. One percent of $18 Million is $180,000. He wants you to send that amount before he will release the money. If you send him the money, you have just been fleeced. There is no money waiting to be sent to your account. This is a scam!
There is a variety or processing fees or gratuities (bribes) which must be paid along the way. The skids must be greased. We have heard from reliable sources that this could amount to well over $200,000 before all is said and done.
Most scam artists will use yahoo.com, hotmail.com, justice.com, or some other similar untraceable email address. But they send out so many scams that they have a hard time keeping up with everybody. That's why many times you will see the name with a number behind it -- (e.g. iniobong1235@yahoo.com).
Some
of the big time operators will even pay the airfare for you to come
over to the country of their
destination. Here's a hint: Do Not Accept! One
way or another, that "free trip"
will cost you dearly, perhaps your
life.
Here is a strategy our acquaintances have tried with great success. Give the scam artists your DHL number (It'll cost you about $40. Money well spent if you are interested in playing this little game) and have them send you the actual document or certificate, along with three business cards from their lawyer and the bank official. Plus three copies of the bank brochure. These items must all be sent to you the very next day. You want to communicate a sense of urgency to minimize the amount of time it takes for them to create quality-looking fake documents. Why three copies of each? It means that they can't make just one fake business card. They have to make three of each. One of our acquaintances received some items that looked like a child put them together, cut with a pair of scissors. (Want to see a scan of five of the actual business cards which were sent via DHL?) It is funny and pitiful at the same time. The other documents which were sent (Certificate of Deposit and Contractual Agreement) were returned, simply because that's what was promised. But the scam artists claimed that the documents were never returned, trying to heap a ton of "guilt" in the direction of the sender.
If you get sucked into a 419 scam, just remember that the scam artists are playing upon the blindness of your own gullibility, greediness or neediness.
Once you have discovered that you have been scammed you will probably become very angry. You will fire off an email, or a telephone call -- with threatening words. You might even threaten to go to the FBI with your information.
The scam artist will then calmly say, "Go ahead and threaten to bring the strong arm of the law upon me. I will then tell them how you were ready to engage in an illegal activity, dealing with illegal funds. I will roast you so badly that you won't know what hit you." That threat alone is sufficient to stop most folks from following through on their threats. The scam artist goes free, with your money, ready to scam another greedy sucker.
Circus promoter, P. T. Barnum stated that a sucker is born every minute. 419 scam artists prove this to be true every day! Don't be another statistic.
New variations of the scheme are being developed all the time but the most common forms of these fraudulent business proposals fall into these main categories:
Transfer of funds from "over-invoiced" or "over-estimated" contracts relating to resources, medical equipment, Turn Around Maintenance (TAM) or infrastructure
Assistance escaping the country with accumulated wealth (bribe money / graft)
Efforts to defraud government on "forgotten" or "former regime" accounts
Contract fraud (C.O.D. of goods or services)
Conversion of hard currency or money laundering
Sale of crude oil or other commodities at below-market prices
Transfer of accounts of now defunct companies
Require money for chemicals to "clean" large amounts of marked currency
Purchase of real estate
Deposed Leaders and their families (widows, sons) and associates (aides, lawyers)
Over-invoiced contracts and government employees (NNPC, Central Bank of Nigeria)
Forgotten accounts, wills and inheritances, death-bed claims of wealth.
Trade deals
Assistance getting stolen assets (cash, diamonds) out of the country
Gifts or bequests to charitable or religious organizations
Scholarships
Lottery winnings
Relative killed in World Trade Center left a fortune
Bogus job offers with rebate of wage overpayment using third party checks
Inflated and expense-paid offers to buy and ship your used vehicle to Nigeria
EVERY unsolicited email or fax you receive that looks even close - like unto the ones listed - is a fraud.
It's
called an "advance fee" scam. They all make the empty
promise of big money and then ask you to "advance" them
some money -- any amount. They will start high, but if you protest
they will come down. All they want you to do is to advance them some
money. It is that simple. Everything complicated gets real simple
when you grasp this simple reality
Run! (don't just walk), away from these frauds.
The Diverse Strategies of the Scams
They will send you photographs, documents, files, court agreements, or anything you ask for to prove their legitimacy. They will pose as attorneys, government officials, embassy officials, religious figures, and sympathetic characters to further support this illusion. The bottom line is everything is in all likelihood false.
Every person is likely fictitious and probably the same person acting all roles. All documents provided are usually no more than worthless computer generated paper. Whatever proof you ask for, they will generate it on the computer, but in the end it normally will all be counterfeit. All photographs provided can be of anyone – a stolen photo, or out of a magazine. The photographs are all untraceable and anonymous. It is often true that it is not the real people behind these scams.
All addresses provided are likely illegitimate, fictitious, or non-existent. They will provide you fake websites or Yahoo! E-mail addresses (most preferred). They have created very authentic looking websites through domains located in other countries to protect their trail. They have even assumed the identities of real persons, attorneys, government officials, and even members of the clergy. This impersonation of real persons (identity theft) allows them to create further illusions to their bona fides should someone attempt to conduct a verification on their credibility. In the end, they are all invisible, faceless people hiding behind the Internet anonymously in any country where the odds of them ever being identified, caught, or prosecuted are almost non-existent.
All telephone numbers provided will be cell phones. They do not generally provide landline telephone numbers, since these numbers can be easily traced to a physical location. Anyone can easily purchase an inexpensive cell phone on a street corner and then purchase anonymously a pre-paid SIM card to operate their "business" out of this cell phone number, without ever having to provide any subscriber information.
If they believe that they are being traced, identified, or near arrest, they can abandon their fake identities by tossing these pre-paid cell phone and any tools of their trade into a public trashcan and walk away, thus protecting their true identities.
For faxes, they will provide hard-line numbers to public Internet or Cybernet Cafes to further hide their clandestine operations and anonymity (and where they operate their e-mails and fake websites too). Over the Internet, they are "pretenders" and can assume the identity of anyone whom they want to be, and they can provide you any fake document or photo you want as proof. Since many names, stories, and modus operandi are similar to other scams here, it is suspected that the same ring is running several scams at once.
Many victims refuse to believe that they have become a target or a victim, or that they can "out con" these professional scam artists. Whenever a victim instructs the “attorney” or “heir” to contact the US Embassy, they will always provide the victim reasons why they cannot do this. The victim must realize that if these people have cell phones, have access to their e-mail and the Internet, and travel freely to a bank or Western Union / MoneyGram to retrieve wired funds, then they certainly are capable of contacting or visiting the US Embassy. It is usually at this time that the scam artists know the scam has been recognized, and will quickly abandon the scam and break off communications with the victim, or then pose as law enforcement officials to “assist” them further with retrieving their lost funds. Of course, there will be new additional “advance fees” to do this.
Any money wired to them will be forever lost and irretrievable. If they hook a victim, they will always insist money be wired through Western Union or MoneyGram. They prefer Western Union and MoneyGram because these funds can be easily retrieved at any branch (thousands of them) throughout the country using their false ID. The branch locations where they retrieve the wired funds are virtually impossible to identify. And, without a subpoena, Western Union and MoneyGram (in the US) will not provide any information to the victim or law enforcement agency.
The scammer will seldom provide legitimate bank account numbers as these can be traced back to tangible locations. If they provide a specific account to a specific bank, successful surveillances have been made to arrest the “fraud baiters.” They learn from their mistakes, and their share “lessons learned” within their sub-cultured network.
These 419 “fraud baiters” are smart, devious, and heartless. They are also dangerous and ruthless. They have lured victims to many countries where they have kidnapped them for ransom, killed them, or both. They will not hesitate to bribe judges, officials, or witnesses, and they will not hesitate to kill anyone who interferes with their organized crime operations, or anyone who cooperates with the police investigating them. They operate invisibly and are nearly impossible to identify, locate, arrest, and prosecute.
They prey upon the greed, gullibility, loneliness, and the sympathies of their intendeDvictims, many of whom are quite educated.
Most “fraud baiters” often pose on singles websites (Matchmaker or Christian singles websites) posing as Christian women or men. These are also known as Romance scams, and have successfully duped many trusting and lonely Christians out of large sums of money.
They have posed as priests, ministers, evangelists, missionaries and even nuns being persecuted in Muslim countries, and they are trying to find ways to get the tithes of their church out of the country. Of course, the riches they promise will require you to provide them some "advance fee" for the attorney, licenses, and new unforeseen bureaucratic requirements that will be never ending.
The first fees will be small, but one bureaucratic problem leads to another requiring just "one more" payment to create the illusion that you are almost there. This dangle or "carrot" of just one more payment to receive all of these millions will eventually add up to thousands of dollars. By then, it is too late.
If such money did exist, they will not share it with a complete stranger they met over the Internet in exchange for assisting them. If such money existed, they would have family, friends, and political contacts that would gladly help them. Remember; if you send any money to these people consider it lost forever.
Regretfully, some have contacted the police too late after losing their entire life's savings (hundreds of thousands of dollars) expecting to receive these millions in return, to adopt an orphaned refugee, or find a new love, spouse or companion they met over the Internet.
SECTION
II
Common Versions
There are many variations on the most common stories, and also many variations on the way the scam works. The following are notable deviations from the standard Letter Scam, but still retain the core elements; the victim is deceived by some disproportionately large gain into sending an advance payment, which once made is irrecoverable. This section will discuss each of their tricks in detail with true-life-story from the victims.
Romance scam
Are you wondering if the person that you are talking to looks too good to be true? Are there things that you are being told that just don't make sense? Did the person find you on a singles site and start professing their love for you in a short time? Did they tell you that they were currently working or living in a foreign country? Are they telling you that they are having trouble cashing their pay checks? If so, you might be the target of an Internet "romance scam." These scams can come to you disguised in several ways.
A Romance Scam is a confidence trick involving feigned romantic intentions towards a victim, gaining their affection, and then using that goodwill to commit fraud. Fraudulent acts may involve access to the victims' money, bank accounts, credit cards, passports, e-mail accounts, and/or national identification numbers or by getting the victims to commit financial fraud on their behalf.
Most romance scams originate from Africa, countries of ex-Soviet Union, and Asia.
In fact, they could be someone you could see yourself spending the rest of your life with. They will introduce themsevels as a decent person with a good job or business in search of a good, honest partner to settle down with.
You or someone you know may be dating this person online right now. However, be warned. Things are not what they appear to be. The acclaimed successful businessman in UK or US may in reality be a criminal sitting somewhere in Asia or Africa with a well-rehearsed script he's used many times before. He's hunting through chat rooms, dating sites and social networking sites searching for victims, looking to cash in on romance. If you are over 40, recently divorced, a widow, elderly or disabled then then you must be a clear target. Scammers are adept at psychological profiling, and use any weakness they find to their advantage.
It is one of the newest evolutions of scamming. Instead of sending spam letters that promise millions for your assistance, these scammers are targeting single men and women who are searching for love online. They pretend to be interested in you and provide you their “IM or email address" so that you can continue communicating with them both online and on phone. Online dating scammers use IM or email to try and build a relationship with you and they eventually confess their love for you, when you click with them, the scam kicks into a high gear, making you committed without knowing it's a romance scam.
They use psychological tricks to lure their victims in, use poetry and even gifts to get them under their spell, and then once you are there, they will try to reach to your wallet, all the time declaring their "undying love" for you. The scam may take the form of asking you to cash a check for them through your bank account because they are "out of the country" and unable to cash it themselves, they may come right out and ask you to send money to help them out of a fabricated "financial difficulty" they claim to be experiencing, or they claim to have sent you a gift of gold and diamond through a fake courier company with a fake website and tracking code, the gift will eventually hang in Malaysia or any country and they will request you to pay money for it to be released. These are all lies used to try to make them easy money from an unsuspecting victim.
The sad truth is, for every real profile you see on the internet, there are numerous false ones pretending to be your perfect mate and using photographs stolen from modelling or social networking sites. The people in the photographs are as much victims as the people who get scammed for hundreds, thousands, even tens of thousands of dollars. Internet romance scams and other related crimes are very real, and they are affecting even ruining lives throughout the world.
The
best
weapon against this crime is education and that is the purpose of
this book. The more people who gets educated in the ways the scams
work, the harder it is for the scammers to make money and the more
scammers that can be put out of business. Hopefully, most of them
will look for legitimate businesses for themselves though some of
them can’t think of anything profitable because they have neither
a good skill nor good educational background.