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The 419eater Community Pulls Some Legs
trusteR writes "Always in the pursuit to rid the world of
419 scams with new and often very entertaining strategies, the class of 419eater.com
have set new records in making scambaiting an entertaining and funny artform. Shipping ANUS laptops, $$$, Death treats, Audio and lots of pictures." This beats the amusement value of a Captain Kirk passport; the scam-baiters here managed to get cash in the mail and get rid of some less-than-perfect hardware.
If I read the article (or discussion rather) correctly, this guy is conning a 419-guy from "LAGOS" into paying $200 cash + $4500 cheque for "large boxes of misc garbage with a broken laptop that has "ANUS" inscribed on the screen".
I hope the cheque bounced, if this guy did cash in the cheque, wouldn't he be in more trouble? ie receiving the money but providing bogus goods?
If the cheque didn't go through, this guy still can't touch that $200 cash, because there might be some 'misunderstanding' (well that's what the 419-guy will say in court). So this $200 must be held until the cheque is made and cashed (or cash be returned if the transaction cannot be completed).
Rock that crushes, Paper & Scissors that don't matter.
-Phixxr
ungggghhhh
this site need cache - http://66.102.9.104/search?q=cache:vyoLxQBww68J:sp l.haxial.net/nigerian-fraud/
I wouldn't worry too much about some scammer from Lagos challenging the payment in a US court. Those who come to the courts with unclean hands seldom get any relief.
Even if the scammer did arrive, how does one demonstrate that the goods shipped were not in fact what was ordered in such a way as to convice a court that your scamming activities are minor enough by comparison as to give you relief?
Trying to use sarcasm in text-based forums does not work.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Why did you have to report it now? They haven't even finished it, and the site has enough problems with bandwidth already.
Great, now the site is slashdotted.
hows about some 419maulers.com ... instead of simply making fun of the scammers, we should abuse them with medieval torture devices and post the pictures on the internet!
"Tragedy struck today as a group of "nerds" called the '419Eaters' were killed in, what is being described as, a classic Organized Crime killing. In other news, Britney Spe...."
DAMN YOU OCTODOG! DAMN YOU TO HELL!
They got this one guy to send a pic of himself holding up a sign that said "I take it up the arse."
/.
i can't link it bc the site is
Lemme guess, these are manufactured on Christmas Island.
That these people are master baiters now?
"death treats"?
"Da ist ein Technölüst in mein Unterpanten!"
Using morally suspect methods to beat the bad guys is so often lauded. Why?
Admittedly, there's a cool factor here, and I'm all for educating the public to prevent these types of scams, but using scammers' game against them distinguishes you from them how?
Servers just succumbed to the /.ing. From what I read, guy packed 200 pounds of dead hardware in boxes and made the guy pre-pay for shipping. He put a value on the packages for 9500 bucks, which means the poor scammer at the other end will have to pay import fees or something along those lines.
Interesting note in the forum thread, for every 30lbs it is costing this guy $475. Funny stuff. He does have a picture of the 200 in cash.
Wow, even with no comments it's gone splat. I guess a semi-work around will have to suffice.
There was a time i had an outstanding debt on my credit report... i got a call once saying that they were a new collection agency handling my account and that if i paid them right then, they would significantly reduce the amount owed...
well i decided to ask them to mail me the details and they refused...they too had a sense of urgency that made me a little edgy. my scam alarms were going off so i hung up the phone and went on my way.
~slashdot are my only freinds ):
From the summary:
...Death treats...
I just gotta get some of those! That'll take care of those pesky costumed kids with their shrill cries of "tricker-treat" about this time each year!
While I don't mind a scammer getting karma-lized, I have to wonder about the whole procedure. Of course, the legality of the scammar isn't the question, but rather the legality of the counter-scammer. This sounds about the same as the P-p-powerbook (which I'm sure everyone remembers): Sending false goods, misappropiating funds, etc. However, for any charges to be pressed, it will have (had) to be intercepted by federal agents and seen for what it is, or the scammar will have to spill the beans. Both cases are very unlikely, so the counter-scammar is probably safe.
However, I suggest against going this far in the future. Keeping the guy going with fake e-mails is probably fine and well, but when you start with the exchange of funds or goods (sic), where is the line drawn that the counter-scammer doesn't become a scammer himself?
'Nuff said.
The old saws still apply:
If a deal sounds too good to be true, it probably isn't.
Proverbs 21:19
It is interesting that a guy passing counterfeit $200 bills with Geroge W Bush's pictures cannot be charged for counterfeiting because there is no such thing as a $200 bill...
Let's see, these scammers send a rubber check written for an amount greater than the sum of their purchase, ask for a refund in cash - then cash and their items for free. How is this different than a standard bad check scam?
Who in this day and age still accepts checks from strangers over the Internet and ships without waiting for the funds to clear first, or verifiying the check electronically? Even newbie eBay sellers make sure funds clear before shipping. You want your item shipped now, you pay by a more verifiable method.
It seems to me, anyone that falls for a bad check scam nowadays gets what they have coming to them. I did RTFA and it's pretty damn funny that the baiters manager to get the scammer to send cash along with his rubber check, but truthfully, if you're a seller and you ship items to someone you don't know before clearing their payment, you deserve to be scammed.
---
DRM is like antifreeze, to the MPAA/RIAA it's sweet, to the consumers it's poison.
Somehow the cynic in my brain (*) thinks of every time a company gets sued for violating the law, environmental considerations, or anti-trust issues they seem to get away.
(*) No, really. It's an entirely separate cynic that lives in my brain.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
You mean, .
If a deal sounds too good to be true, it probably is
-rylin
So when my doctor tells me I urgently need to have my pancreas removed there's a 95% chance that he's trying to scam me? That bastard, I'm going to tell him to go to hell right away!
"Have you ever thought about just turning off the TV, sitting down with your kids, and hitting them?"
Ah, you do us GNAA-haters proud with your moderately original frosty piss. I salute you!
Hence the phrase, "second opinion."
This next song is very sad. Please clap along. -- Robin Zander
This isn't a cache of the article refered to!
This is a cache of the "James Kirk" article
I get all my second opinions from Slashdot.
"Have you ever thought about just turning off the TV, sitting down with your kids, and hitting them?"
$Superhero: Not so fast, evil scammers! This website has been mirrordotted!
[Cue: spammers cringe in fear, as the stampede of the nerds is rendered harmless.]
Comment removed based on user account deletion
>>So when my doctor tells me I urgently need to have my pancreas removed
It's not so much that it needs to be removed as he just wants to make the opening to it wider.
This probably would have been a hell of a lot funnier if he had said "prostate." Ah, well...
Ryosen
One man's "Troll, +1" is another man's "Insightful, +1".
(I'm not a doctor, but...) If your doctor tells you you urgently need to get your pancreas removed, get a second opinion. You will die very quickly without insulin.
Thank you. I'll be here all week.
This next song is very sad. Please clap along. -- Robin Zander
4 days till Halloween.
If I read the article (or discussion rather) correctly, this guy is conning a 419-guy from "LAGOS" into paying $200 cash + $4500 cheque for "large boxes of misc garbage with a broken laptop that has "ANUS" inscribed on the screen".
.
This is my form letter response to any 419 scam. Do not follow the link in it; it goes to a site with a large number of disgusting porn popups.
THANK YOU FOR THIS OPPORTUNITY TO INVEST.
I AM VERY GREATFUL YOU CAME TO ME FIRST, INSTEAD OF TO SOME OTHER PERSON, WHO MIGHT TRY AND STEAL MORE THAN HIS FAIR SHARE FROM YOU.
THAT WOULD BE A TERRIBLE TRAGEDY. I WOULD LOVE TO HELP YOU AND YOUR CAUSE. MY CONTACT PROFILE IS AVAILABLE HERE: http://www.aderkach.org/?u=Ich
PLEASE RESPOND WHEN YOU WOULD LIKE TO MAKE THE TRANSFER.
GOD BLESS.
Mod "Overrated" instead of replying "I disagree with you," you coward.
I've yet to ever hear of a doctor who tells you something urgent over the phone, and insist you schedule the surgery right then and there, otherwise losing out on some hot deal.
DOH!
Proverbs 21:19
The Number One Rule: If you're every involved in something, and the other party has some crazy sense of urgency, there's a 95% posability it's a scam.
Absolutely. This is exactly how I feel every time I visit a car dealership or mechanic. "You'll have to put $500 down so I can go clear this deal with my boss." What the heck is that about? Forget it. Or, "There are cracks in your serpentine belt, so it could break at any time. We'll put a new one on for $90. It's not safe to leave here without having it changed." Yeah, right... the belt costs less than $20 and I can change it myself in under 10 minutes, and I have next to no mechanical skills. I don't think so. Besides, a belt will start to show small cracks in a few months, and they're good for several years.
September 18 was 419eater.com's first birthday, and it's the site where I learned about scambaiting.
The webmaster, "Shiver Metimbers" (obviously not his real name), held a contest in honor of the event. The goal was to get a scammer to hold up a sign reading "HAPPY BIRTHDAY 419EATER" -- and since a number of scammers already knew what the website was (and since 419 itself might cause the "smarter" scammers to twig anyway), it was something of a challenge. The successful baiter would win the contest. If multiple victories were secured before September 18, the readers of the 419eater.com forum would vote on the best picture.
I rose to the challenge. Though it took me until the last minute to secure an entry, I did finally have a worthy submission. I find it interesting that jonbarry, whose "nude gender-undetermined mugu" picture ended up taking second place, actually encouraged people to consider voting for me instead.
I don't attribute the end result to skill, just luck in finding the right scammer dumb enough to fall for it. You can read the email exchange that led to the pictures and see the pictures themselves at my Birthday Bait page.
I've yet to update it with the final details, though I can report that I was unable to secure any nice new pictures from the lad. I got a little overeager (I figured that I had nothing to lose by asking for a nude group shot, but no dice).
As for the other entries...well, when the 419eater.com forum comes back up, search the Pictures forum for "Birthday" in the subject line. You should come up with a locked topic that has the entries and the final vote totals.
STOP MISUSING APOSTROPHES, YOU MORONS!!!
If I'm a con artist, I would love it if every mark thought he was going to turn the tables on me. Makes my job all the easier.
TANSTAAFL, people. Reality is not nearly as exciting as delusion. But it's a lot more reliable.
"Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, it doesn't go away." - Philip K. Dick
...is the guy pouring a cup of water over himself while holding a sign that reads "I SOAK IN GOLDEN SHOWERS"
:)
But then, perhaps I'm a bit biased (look at the submitter)
STOP MISUSING APOSTROPHES, YOU MORONS!!!
Might be folklore, but I read somewhere that "scam" stands for the following:
Right you are, urgency should always be a tip-off.
Imagine how much harder physics would be if electrons had feelings! -Feynman, maybe
So when my doctor tells me I urgently need to have my pancreas removed there's a 95% chance that he's trying to scam me?
No, moron, that would be part of the 5% that's *not* a scam.
Steve Jobs, is that you?
Virtual reverse-scams are safest...I convinced one of these guys that I (in the guise of Sam Walton) was traveling to Abidjan to meet him. I even tied up all the loose ends by creating a fake news story about Sam's adventures.
"We make our world significant by the courage of our questions and by the depth of our answers." Carl Sagan
Unless your at the Post Office. :)
where can I get me some of those?
Now... is that "your" post office?
Or is did you mean "you're" (as in "you are")?
Don't cash the check if the spammer expects you to send back the extra $500. The spamer is now probably running a different type of scam on you. The check is probably bogus; after you cash it and send the spammer the $500 the bank will come after you for a refund of $4500 (plus bounce check fees) and then you will be out $300 instead of ahead $200.
That was me, er.. my company that called you in regards to your outstanding debt. If you'll please post your account information including date of birth, social security number and at least, two major credit cards numbers with expiration dates we'll halve the amount due.
Thank you,
Your friendly credit company.
( Seriously folks, this is a _joke_ - don't reply to it seriously like someone did when I sent out an office memo stating that the voting polls were going to be too busy Nov 2nd and that Kerry supports should go Nov 2nd, Bush supports should go on the 3rd. )
There's a gorilla from Manilla whose a fella that stinks of vanilla and has salmonella.
It's kind of a corrolary to "if it sounds too good to be true" bit: if it sounds like someone made up an acronym for an existing word, they probably did.
Sorry to say that For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge and Fornication Under Consent of King also do not describe the etymology of any particular word either.
I don't think I would deliberately try to get a criminal infuriated at me.
I don't even try to get ordinary citizens infuriated at me.
Nigeria is only a few hundred dollars away (these days it may be more relevant to measure airfare in dollars than miles).
"How to Do Nothing," kids activities, back in print!
Mirrordot here.
"419 Scams" comes from section section 419 of the Nigerian Criminal Code, which should be used to prosecute these guys.
- you advertise an expensive item on line..car, piano etc.
- an "agent" for an interested buyer responds, perhaps in an exchange of several emails to build
your confidence...after all YOU initiated this transaction.
- if scammer is in a big hurry, he offers an extra few thousand $ "for shipping" and , sight-unseen sends you a cashiers check with sometimes complex instructions that the check should be cashed immediately and the excess mailed or wired to some 4th party who is the "shipper" and requires payment before he will pick up the goods.
- your bank honors the cashiers check
- you wire the money
- 3 days later the bank tells you the check was a forgery and debits its full amount from your account.
- and of course, no shipper ever arrives
For me, the eagerness of the "agent" to pay full price for a piano they never saw set off alarms. My state's atty Gen. office had a web page exactly describing the scam. The headers on the email were hard to trace but I could not tell whether the buyer was supposedly in NY or London. When the FEDEX arrived with the check and the country code was NG, that was the last straw. I now have a totally phoney cashiers check , a good piece to study if you want to learn how to spot forgeries, framed in the den. We got one phone call [which I wish I knew how to trace...don't give out your phone number!] and several frantic e-mails from our scammer. When I offered to "save" him some money by waiting until the check cleared and sending him back the excess over what the shipping would really have cost, he protested that the buyer might soon change their mind about the purchase. When I subsequently gave him the URL for the AGO's website and accused him of fraud he acted hurt. I never told him about the typo in the fine-print stripe urging me to read the missing "Bank of America water mark".Uh, anybody want to by a piano?
if you are going to play these games, you might want to bookmark the Fedex country codes page and set up one or more spam-hole email accounts.
SLASHDOT: news for people who can't concentrate on work or have no life at all and got tired of yelling back at the TV.
If these guys show up at your door, then yes, definitely tell them to piss off.
There is a site that is designed to run up the usage of web sites used by scammers to close some deals. The idea is to get as many 509 errors as possible. http://www.aa419.org/ladvampire.html Leave it running all day!
Would this be a "helper" position to enable the scammers to operate???
Donald 'Duck' Dunn: We had a band powerful enough to turn goat piss into gasoline.
Recently, we gave up on anyone ever coming for the loot and divvied it up. Two pairs of jeans for me (size 32x30), a couple button-up shirts for my co-worker (size XXL!), and the perfume went to eBay.
Too bad... I wanted a free laptop.
what's really funny is you gor an insightful mod!
-nB
whois gawk date unzip strip find touch finger mount join nice man top fsck grep eject more yes exit umount sleep dump
Everything seems to be slashdotted, so I'm going to ask my question here in hopes of getting an answer: How did the anit-scammer manage to get the 419 scammer to actually send money? I know from what little I've been able to learn that the 419 scammer sent a bad check and was hoping to get merchandise and even money back on an "over payment", but how did the the anti-spammer convince the 419 scammer to send real money?
I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
girl friend that her photo was going to wind up on a slashdotted page;?)
SLASHDOT: news for people who can't concentrate on work or have no life at all and got tired of yelling back at the TV.
I wonder if I could convince any of them to buy me stuff..."my only computer is at my office, and my boss reads my e-mails and he is very greedy, in order to better assist you with this transaction and ensure your funds are safely delivered, I require a private computer for which I can access remotely. You may deduct the cost of the computer from my assistance fee."
Only problem is, getting a safe address to ship it to, where I wouldn't have angry Nigerians coming to kill me.
The P.O. box at my college is probably fairly safe, but I don't know *how* safe. heh.
The downed server reminds me of the ThinkGeek crash, see http://www.thinkgeek.com/slashdotted/index.shtml
./'ed server looks like ;-)
They even have a nice picture of how a
Look, this thing is totally safe! Built it myself, you know. You just press that button like this and then turn that lev
Completely pales in comparison to the time when the scammers tried to scam the head in a jar... That was a really beautiful way to merge Lovecraftian horrors and popular Internet sports. As the page says, a masterpiece.
While 419eater.com is down, you could all slashdot some other targets: fake bank websites that those 419 criminals use to defraud their victims. And the best way to do this is of course to run the LAD VAMPIRE:
http://www.aa419.org/ladvampire.html
Have fun with it!
That sounds like a back-formation rather than the source of it. OTOH, acronymical mnemonics are fun -- and in this case, instructive. Wish my dad would learn this one ;)
timothy
jrnl: http://tinyurl.com/c2l8yr / foes: http://tinyurl.com/ckjno5
Should that be SCUM, then?
Much more appropriate!
Send it to a spammer? Send it to ME!
This post written under Gentoo-linux with an SCO IP license.
Since the 419eater.com site is having trouble handling the Slashdotting, here's a link to the Google Cached version. Please mod up this comment if you find it useful.
Nigerian Advance Fee Fraud Overview
The perpetrators of Advance Fee Fraud (AFF), known internationally as "4-1-9" fraud after the section of the Nigerian penal code which addresses fraud schemes, are often very creative and innovative.
Unfortunately, there is a perception that no one is prone to enter into such an obviously suspicious relationship. However, a large number of victims are enticed into believing they have been singled out from the masses to share in multi-million dollar windfall profits for doing absolutely nothing. It is also a misconception that the victim's bank account is requested so the culprit can plunder it -- this is not the primary reason for the account request -- merely a signal they have hooked another victim.
* In almost every case there is a sense of urgency.
* The victim is enticed to travel to Nigeria or a border country.
* There are many forged official looking documents.
* Most of the correspondence is handled by fax or through the mail.
* Blank letterheads and invoices are requested from the victim along with the banking particulars.
* Any number of Nigerian fees are requested for processing the transaction with each fee purported to be the last required.
* The confidential nature of the transaction is emphasized.
* There are usually claims of strong ties to Nigerian officials.
* A Nigerian residing in the U.S., London or other foreign venue may claim to be a clearing house bank for the Central Bank of Nigeria.
* Offices in legitimate government buildings appear to have been used by impostors posing as the real occupants or officials.
The most common forms of these fraudulent business proposals fall into the following main categories:
* Disbursement of money from wills
* Contract fraud (C.O.D. of goods or services)
* Purchase of real estate
* Conversion of hard currency
* Transfer of funds from over invoiced contracts
* Sale of crude oil at below market prices
The most prevalent and successful cases of Advance Fee Fraud is the fund transfer scam. In this scheme, a company or individual will typically receive an unsolicited letter by mail from a Nigerian claiming to be a senior civil servant. In the letter, the Nigerian will inform the recipient that he is seeking a reputable foreign company or individual into whose account he can deposit funds ranging from $10-$60 million that the Nigerian government overpaid on some procurement contract.
The criminals obtain the names of potential victims from a variety of sources including trade journals, professional directories, newspapers, and commercial libraries. They do not target a single company, but rather send out mailings en masse. The sender declares that he is a senior civil servant in one of the Nigerian Ministries, usually the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC).
The letters refer to investigations of previous contracts awarded by prior regimes alleging that many contracts were over invoiced. Rather than return the money to the government, they desire to transfer the money to a foreign account. The sums to be transferred average between $10,000,000 to $60,000,000 and the recipient is usually offered a commission up to 30 percent for assisting in the transfer.
Initially, the intended victim is instructed to provide company letterheads and pro forma invoicing that will be used to show completion of the contract. One of the reasons is to use the victim's letterhead to forge letters of recommendation to other victim companies and to seek out a travel visa from the American Embassy in Lagos. The victim is told that the completed contracts will be submitted for approval to the Central Bank of Nigeria. Upon approval, the funds will be remitted to an account supplied by the intended victim.
The goal of the criminal is to delude the target into thinking that he is being drawn into a very lucrative, albeit questionable, arrangement. The i
They're making the scammer for shipping of:
"7 boxes of dead old computer equipment and bricks"
There: Something at a specific location.
Their: Owned by someone.
Please make sure your english compiles.
Urgency is definately a tip of to a SCAM, most of which are perpetrated by:
S - Sure thing
C - Confidence
U - Urgent
M - Money
I had an interesting encounter with this sort of scam. I was selling my folding kayak (yes, a kayak that fits into a backpack!), and advertised in various online classified ads (not eBay, though). About half of the email inquiries that I received involved the buyer having some client (of the buyer) send me money in the form of a "casshier's check in united states of american". But it was too much money, see, so if I could just send him the excess with my kayak that I was selling.
Now, one or maybe two such email messages I can accept as possibly genuine, but not half a dozen of them, all with atrocious grammatical errors. Here's a sample:
So, I decided to have some fun with a scammer or two.
First, the email mentions "last price" which seems to refer to an auction where the price is always changing, but I had never advertised on eBay or such. So I simply replied, "Well, the price is just as advertised --what price did you see on the ad? Because if it's wrong, I have to change it." Well, none of the three or four scammers (I quit after the fourth one) would state the price. I have no doubt they just got some computer script to cull the web for ads and mass-mail all of them. They probably do it with some MS Word macro or something.
Second, I advertised my folding kayaks on a web site for folding kayaks, so I didn't actually put "folding kayak" in the ad. It was obvious that none of the scammers had any idea what I was actually selling. So I replied in my email that I wanted to make sure they knew how to use the item. How far had they gone in one? Any problems with rolling? ("Rolling" refers to the spectacular technique where, when you're upside-down in the water in a capsized kayak, you can heave yourself out of the water and flip back upright while remaining seated in the canoe at all times.) Of course, I deliberately refrained from revealing what the item was; they had no idea that "the item" was something you travelled in, much less know what I meant by "rolling", and their cluelessness in their responses was laughable.
Every time they would respond asking me for my address and phone, and every time I would insist that they answer my questions about the price and whether they knew how to use "the item". It was great for laughs. After a while, I got bored and stopped. But, boy, lots of potential for mischief there.
As an aside, I was trying to figure out how to ship my kayak to an honest buyer who would send me the money. Some people suggested escrow.com, but I came up with another plan: I would ship the buyer everything except one or two crucial pieces. I would ship the kayak minus the crucial piece, and then wait for payment, and then ship the crucial piece. Before I received payment, the kayak and the crucial piece were equally useless to the buyer and myself, so both of us would be motivated to honestly complete the transaction. As it turned out, I sold to someone who could physically come to my home to pick up the canoe and give me cash, so my scheme was never needed.
404555974007725459910684486621289147856453481154 in hex is "You sank my Battleship?"
[GPG key in journal]
The 419ers are getting more imaginative, also.
See this account of how a person looking for a roommate was almost scammed out of $5000.
Those who sacrifice security to condemn liberty deserve to repeat history or something. - Benjamin Santayana
The old saws still apply:
;)
The old saws seem to be a little rusty.
$0.02 (CDN)
That is actually very clever way to get back at em because nigerians are highly superstitious and get spooked easily.
Preserve old classics: copy your collection onto all hard drives.
Sounds to me like you're one of em scammers trying to scare people from messing with your kind...
Preserve old classics: copy your collection onto all hard drives.
One look at the faked passport will tell you this guy at 419eater is an amateur. Everyone knows that James Tiberius Kirk is from Iowa, not Maryland.
it's a common typo among Nigerina programmers.
Fight Frist Psoting!
Browse Slashdot with 'Newest First'!
from 419eaters forum index, now that it is back:
Most users ever online was 691 on Wed Oct 27, 2004 6:14 pm
-
I'll send you a fake cheque, you send me lots and lots of pot.
500GB of disk, 5TB of transfer, $5.95/mo
Could be either? I don't even remember typing it.