Nigerian Scam Letters

turnkey4099 · Dec 26, 2003

One would think that common sense would keep people from biting on this but nooooo. Spokane Wa had an investment broker of all people bit on it. Lost all of his money a lot of customers money before he wised up.

It's too bad that stupidity isn't painful.

Harry K

slowrev · Dec 26, 2003

Harry,
I guess stupidity is painful when you loose all of your money over it. Many stupid things we do seem like such a good idea at the time... Take marriage for instance /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif

Hank · Dec 27, 2003

the U.S. Government has warned the Government of Nigeria 

If they did, it wouldn't mean much, because the scam emails do not, for the most part, even originate from Nigeria.

And now it (the scam) is starting to appear "from" other countries. I just received one purportedly from a bank manager in China. I tracked the sending IP address, and the actual origin of the email was a dial-up account in Germany.

JDgreen227 · Dec 27, 2003

Slowrev,

I'm sorry you have that attitude towards marriage. As for me, I have always felt the best investment I EVER made was the check I wrote for my wife's engagement ring. Of course, it helped that I picked the right person to marry.

Old_Hickory · Dec 27, 2003

( the U.S. Government has warned the Government of Nigeria ) 

Hank,
That is a rumour anyway about the US gov saying that.
I get the things from supposedly,Iraq/Afgahnistan/Serbia/Ivory Coast.
Some of the letters are typed very poorly,you can tell they do not understand English very well,and some are typed very well.

Bob_Skurka · Dec 27, 2003

Re: TWISTS to Nigerian Scam Letters

There is a REVERSE scam that is similar to the Nigerian Letter Scam for when you want to sell things.

I posted this information before, but as the topic is on again I'll throw out my story. This summer I sold one of my tractors. I posted an advertisement in several places on the internet. Most of the action I got regarding the tractor were from "Americans working for a Multi-National company stationed in . . . and in need of farm equipment to modernize their agricultural economy and feed the people. . ." Mind you I was selling a 50 year old tractor and they are telling me they want to modernize things. Further, I was selling an Oliver, but they insisted that spare parts would not be an issue.

The kicker was that they were INSISTING on paying the full asking price, plus shipping, and some even offered a bonus finders fee. So I would be getting MORE for my tractor than I ever dreamed it could be worth.

They would pay with a foreign cashiers check, their "shipping agent" would give me the check upon pick up, it would be made out to me for the full amount plus the cost of shipping. I was to give them the tractor. I was also supposed to pay the shipping agent, with one of my personal checks, the cost of the shipping fees (since I was getting the fees paid to me I was, of course, at no risk). Off would go my tractor with the shipper. He would, of course, bee line it to the local bank and cash my check, and of course the foreign cashiers check would bounce in about a week, giving them plenty of time to be gone to wherever they came from . . .

There are a LOT of different twists to these scam artists. I didn't realize it the first time I got an offer from one of them, but then a similar offer arrived, and another . . . and then I put 2 + 2 together and figured out what they were trying to do.

Seller beware. Buyer beware. Everyone beware.

Hank · Dec 27, 2003

Some of the letters are typed very poorly,you can tell they do not understand English very well,and some are typed very well. 

I actually believe they all (or most of them) originate from the US.

It is quite easy for anyone nowadays, worldwide, to post emails from anywhere. The To: From: Subject: Date: fields can legally contain anything at all (they are "comment" fields as far as email delivery is concerned...IOW they mean nothing, and have nothing to do with the actual routing and delivery of the email).

I believe they are intentially written to simulate broken English, so they can better appear (to a North American) to be from a foreign country, and thereby lend weight to the scam.