Slashdot Mirror
Sweet Revenge On Nigerian Scammers
davesag writes "I just came across this fine site, 419Eater, wherin people counter scam the Nigerian 419 scammers that have been plaguing our spam filters for the past few years. The UK paper The Guardian is also running a fine article on this site. The site author, and several other contributors, have taken to responding to the scammers, using obviously fake names and so forth, and then string the scammer along for as long as possible. In many cases they get the scammer to pose for a photograph! Amazingly the scammers are just as gullible and greedy as their typical victims, and fall for the most obvious ruses hook, line, and sinker. 419eater welcomes contributors, so if you ever wanted to get your sweet revenge on these low-lives, here's a channel for you. The 419 refers to the section of the Nigerian criminal code under which such scams fall." We've linked to a few such fraud-baiters before, though few with as amusing a photograph.
They look just like I'd imagined too!
In one of the letter threads, he requires the scammer to identify himself on a photo, With His Chosen Password!. Of course, this password is carefully chosen in order to positively identify the business transaction partner.
:-)
Hilarious.
From: "Deeoni Chow" (address classified)
To: Slashdot
Dear Sir.
My name is Deeoni Chow, and I am the Lawyer of Son of Marcos Jacobs, the recently Assassinated President of Nigeria. Your contact information was referred to me by one of my trusted contacts, whose name I am not at liberty to compromize. I would like to approach you with reguards to a possible lawsuite. Please to remove my clients picture from your internet immediately or we shall sue for $16,000,000.00 (SIXTEEN MILLION) US DOLLARS.
Having a nice day, Hope this helping
Deeoni Chow
My favourite anti-scam-scam on that site is the one where they got the Nigerian guy to pose for a business card photo under the name "IAMA DILDO." It's laughalicious!
It's a loaf of bread - the anti-scammer had him pose with a loaf of bread and a bottle of wine in order to "verify his identity" (i.e., waste his time and make him look like a fool).
Brilliant!
Without Nigerian scam artists The Spam Letters would just not be the same. Keeping the above in mind, please reconsider your revenge. Thank you.
Sincerely,
Pan Tarhei Hosé, PhD.
"Homo sum et cogito ergo odi profanum vulgus et libido."
With the amount of information that's online these days, it's not that many more steps to reverse-engineer your identity from there.
That's why Slashdot continues to be the best place to make fun of our way too powerful overlords.