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Nigerian Scammers Brought to Justice
KaushalParekh writes "Almost all of us get those junk emails from someone in Africa usually promising millions of dollars if you give them your bank details. Finally good to know that they are being caught by the authorities and punished. These are also known as 419 emails named after the Nigerian penal code for fraud. As an interesting aside, fooling these scammers by responding to their emails is a fun passtime for quite a few who call themselves baiters. Check out the trophy pictures of these spammers.. pretty funny."
Prince Wathisname is in jail and to pay his bail, we have to get rid of this US$14.2 from his bank...
The 419 in the article says the most common for is email fraud, but the person arrested didn't use email, it was a bank job.
You can't take the sky from me
Recently I received a mail asking for a quote for delivery of a crate of a particular Texas Instruments integrated circuit to a location in Lagos, Nigeria
It was blatantly not a misdirected mail as my email address couldn't be confused with any major electronics retailer. Is there some ongoing scam that relies on getting goods sent and not paying for them? (Escrow fraud?)
I have been a user for about 10 years. This ends Feb 2014. The site's been ruined. I'm off. Dice, FU
The Nigerian Scammer has used all of his money he got from scamming people. I am Blahahe Blahemoni and managing his financials. I hate him. I think he might actually beat the charges so I want to make sure his money isn't here when he gets out. Please send me account information to dump this large pile of ill gotten money. You will have the last laugh. If you got ripped off by this scammer also include how much he got you for and your account will get preference. Although, judging from the account balances there is plenty of money to go around.
T-3 days. Just you wait.
It is no longer uncommon to be uncommon.
"Hello I am a rich computer businessman! I am in currently in jail for rich money making schemes and have money to make bail but it is being tyied up in mutual funds! To being make bail I must deposit it in your bank account and..."
Scambaiting is a fun hobby, but it takes time and patience. Often, the first few responses from the scammer are made from templates. However, when you start to talk about more specific areas, the man has to write you the emails himself. It's very clear when this happens; the language goes from quite proper and polite to sloppy and personal. To take the thread to this point can take weeks in the worst cases.
:-D
Some scammers have also become used to scambaiters, and stop the conversation when you start asking strange things. But it's amazing how far you can get these people to go. Fooling them to travel to another continent and being shown on public webcams is nice.
On the other hand, scambaiting can be rewarding. Getting a picture you requested of the scammer bathing in milk with a goat is pretty priceless!
Sig Nature
Dear Ms Slashdot I, for myslef, am the widow of Dr. Muembe from Burundi. My husband was killed by a coalition of rebels, corrupt militaries, 419 scammers and AOL suscribers. He left me with assets over 1,000,000,000,000,000 US$ in a bank in Cape Town. I heard you were a very reliable person an seek your help...
\u262D = \u5350
The case in this article is a large-scale bank fraud, not the spam-based crap we all get. "Amaka Anajemba admitted helping her late husband to persuade an employee of a Brazilian bank to transfer millions of dollars into overseas accounts." Additionally, this all happened in 1998. Don't hold your breath for any relief from the 419 spam.
Looks like the 419 scammers submitted the 419 baiters' website to Slashdot.
paintball
When they're serving time in their jail cell, be sure to slip them messages like: "Get it up in seconds- for your cellmate Butch!!" "Free keys to YOUR cell!! Limited time offer!!" "Refinance your confiscated home today!!"
It's rather interesting to see that they were caught in Nigeria. Nowadays it seems that more and more of these scammers are actually based outside Nigeria.
Many of the scammers are based in Amsterdam and though they might be originally from African nations, the easy access to technology and communications in more modern cities brings them there.
Let's hope that the more modern policing in western countries helps to catch more of these scammers.
--
BB
Travel the world - virtually
Sparks:Gadget:Beer Maker
Dear Offori Atta,
It is good to see that you are not one of those Nigerian scammers. It would be great to do this business deal with you. However European banking regulations prohibit me from receiving such an amount at once since the bank has to tell this to the goverment and they will investigate it to see if it is legal or not, taking a lot of time. Can you however deposit it in amounts of $20.000,- per time (like once per 5 minutes). That will not raise any alarms.
Best regards,
Jurt1235
My wife's sketchblog Blob[p]: Gastrono-me
Kids, do not do this at home. These people may seem stupid (at times), but they are full blown criminals and quite probably organized criminals at that. From the 419eater website: "Violence and threats of physical harm may be employed to further pressure victims. In June of 1995, an American was murdered in Lagos, Nigeria, while pursuing a 4-1-9 scam, and numerous other foreign nationals have been reported as missing."
This is not fun. Really.
This happened to me last year. I recieved an e-mail stating that I had won $500,000 in a cash giveaway drawing sponsered by a jobsite that I was a member at. After 5 days of e-mailing and lots of international phonecalls I finally learned that it was a group of nigerians operating out of amsterdam trying to get me to send them a money order. I was totally hooked at first...making long distance calls to switzerland to open a swiss account for my 'winnings', booking plane tickets to Amsterdam, etc.
Luckily I figured the whole thing out in time, I nearly sent them a western union money order for $1200 to cover the 'financial legal fees' involved in processing and transferring the 'winnings' into my back account.
I'll admit that I'm not the sharpest knife in the drawer, but these guys had a pretty convincing and elaborate scheme going. I forwarded all of their contact information to a bank in Amsterdam whose name and letterhead they were using. Hopefully they took action.
The government has a defect: it's potentially democratic. Corporations have no defect: they're pure tyrannies. -Chomsky
There was a 60 Minutes peice on a country in South Africa, I think it was Mozambique, but I don't remember.
The news story was about how Exon went to the country, and told their King (the country had a monarchy), they told the King they found oil and wanted to set up Exon refineries and the such. The King, knowing his own people did not have the skill to extract the oil, agreed to sell the oil for $0.02 on the dollar. In one way Exxon was ripping off this country big time. But when one saw the amount of money in the aggregate, one thinks maybe some new roads, hospitals, and schools could be built with this money because this nation was dirt poor, and the people have nothing.
What did the King do? He learned to speak French and purchased a $10,000,000 condo in the Riviera, in the south of France, and another one in Paris. He own dozens of sports cars, including porches. And he will buy 20 suits at once, $10,000 suits, some of which he will never wear. He buys them on impulse.
And what about his country? His brother complained in the newspapers about needing a new school for the capital, for the children. His brother was sentanced to 7 years in prision. Others were executed.
60 minutes went to Exxon to ask them about buying the oil for $.02 on the dollar, about the poltical climate in this African country, and Exxon refused to comment.
Oh, I remember what 60 minutes wanted to ask Exxon. It seems that Exxon has paid for some helicopters to be used in the area, and when there was an uprising, Exxon let the King use those helicopters, sending gunners up in Exxon helicopters to shoot at protestors. Why was Exxon helping the King kill his own people, to protect a contract which was making Exxon executives very rich?
Anyways, the whole point of this post is about greed and self love. Exxon did it, finding an idiot to exploit. The King in return did it to his own people. The only ones who made any money was Exxon and some very overpriced French tailors. It is sad, because the people are the ones who lost out on their resources. The natural resources in the area did not belong to the King, but to ALL the people who lived in that area. And they are the worse off for it.
Rosco: "If brains were gunpowder, Enos couldn't blow his nose."
I have heard that once you go for the bait, you are typically asked to send more and more small sums of money for information. But they actually do mail you some documents which can be typically reproduced free at the many government run social centers. The thing is, they never do actually send any useful information till you give up. Remember, you always send a self addressed envelope so they do not lose. As I write this, a colleague tells me a similar ad exists in todays' free Metro news paper! These Canadians - What are they good at?
The website will celebrate two years of baiting scammers this September. No word if there will be a contest this year, as there was last year (plugging my prize-winning contest entry there), as Shiver is running a Christmas contest (and already has killer entries).
If they're not, you can always get them to join a church or two.
STOP MISUSING APOSTROPHES, YOU MORONS!!!
I myself have quite a bit of experience at leading these folks on. Yes, I'm quite the master baiter... but I figure they deserve it because they keep jerking me around. They're such wankers!
Actually it's a shame you gave up so quickly. There is a shit load of literature, documentaries and new media out of Africa (unsuprisingly, it's a massive content, with a massive population), it just takes a smidge of effort.
Perhaps even a visit may help? The three categories you mention are rightly so cliches - there are poor whites in South Africa, and there are corrupt native africans across the content (and vice versa).
It's a complex place, with complex issues, and a complex history. The best we can do is encourage reconciliationa and support what we assess as noble and valid causes - we may not always be right, but we can try.
Shut down all connections to Nigeria until they clean up their act.
We do it with spammers and irresponsible ISP's, Why not a country ?
I receive Nigerian mails everytime i sell something locally here in Sweden, their translations are laughable (Drunken babelfish) and i can't believe anybody would fall for it, but people do.
I don't know why but i really feel pure hatred for the people who try to scam me with their rediculous mails, and it insults my intelligence as well.
Where can one turn to do some vigilante stuff on these people ?
You would not think some spear chucker could outsmart an American.
Statements like that are immediately disproven when made by an American.
Who ordered that?
I live in South Africa myself, so I can't really recommend any good books on the country, never having had to have read one that gives a visitor's perspective :-)
I can however give you two URL's: the SA Tourism Department's portal to the country : http://www.southafrica.net/ and a privately run website which I know little about but appears to have a fair amount of factual data about SA, at least after a cursory examination: http://www.southafrica.com/
Incidentally, there are plenty of poor white people (although many more black ones) in SA, and plenty of middle-income to filthy rich black, indian and coloured people in SA too. That all white people in SA are filthy rich is just not true, and never has been.
Daar is nie 'n lepel nie
Seriously, if scammers tracked down and killed every baiter that came their way, the human population would have halved in the past few years. That hasn't happened, so my guess is that scammers only go after vigilantes who actually get physically in their way, pose an actual threat or who have managed to convince the scammer that there is an actual threat.
If a criminal decides there is actual danger to life and limb, they are probably going to take the path of least resistance, especially if it is in a relatively lawless area or if there is minimal risk to them personally.
On the other hand, if they have absolutely zero idea of where you are in the world, are pretty sure you pose no danger beyond a sanity check, and are not part of some rival gang, then almost any action they take is likely to put themselves in danger for negligable or zero benefit. I doubt many scammers would find that appealing.
If you mess with a scammer involved in an "Organized Crime" gang, all bets are off. There is really no telling what might happen then. However, most scammers are likely loners and spam merchants of equal skill to your typical skript-kiddie. (That is why most such scams are near-identical and obvious to anyone with more than one brain cell. Anyone with a modicum of skill is likely to be rather better at social engineering and much harder to detect.)
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
...are probably broke students who can't afford the Red Light District -or- the drugs. (You don't seriously think they're there to spend the money on tulips, do you?)
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
Well...
The reason why 419 continue to be at this level is the extreme corruption in Nigeria, Kongo and a number of other African governments.
Also, while it is not the only reason, it is one of the reasons behind the extreme poverty and famine in Africa. For example when 20%+ of Swazi population is dieing of AIDS the king of Swazilend used international aid money on buying new BMWs for his existing 9 wives, refurbishing their palaces and arranging a wedding ceremony for the 10th.
Frankly shooting people like him may be the right approach when dealing with extreme poverty in Subsaharan Africa.
The best way to use the Live8 money would have been to hire a good gang of contract hitmen and "clean it up".
Multiple times if necessary.
Unfortunately it will be given to the same corrupt genocidal f***heads which are in charge now.
Baker's Law: Misery no longer loves company. Nowadays it insists on it
http://www.sigsegv.cx/
Secondly, in order to win a contest, you must first enter. This is one time where "nothing for nothing" really does apply.
Thirdly, if you don't supply someone with your e-mail address, then they don't know who you are, where you are, or indeed anything else. Many sales staff have gimicks, but they rely on being effective at drawing in potential customers. Drawing in someone who won't buy anyway is of no use to them, so that isn't the sort of person they are going to promote to.
Finally, almost any competition with a large prize attached will cost more to win than the prize is actually worth. That is why lottery corporations are richer than even the most successful of "winners". Indeed, there would be little point in running a lottery if they weren't.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
is there any particlular reason that this kind of scam comes mainly from Nigeria? Is it related to the laws there, or a cultural thing? What makes that place different from 100 other countries?
I have been wondering about that for a long time...
I have discovered a truly remarkable sig which this 120 chars is too small to contain.
I had a roommate who starting getting packages dropped off on the porch. There were GAP jeans, shoes, camcorders and other such items. The packages were not addressed directly in her name. She started taking them and sending them back out. I saw the packages were being shipped to Nigeria. A RED light went on. There was no way she could afford all this on her own. I confronted her and found she was reshipping packages to Nigeria for someone she met on the Internet. She told me the original "buyer" could not send packages to Nigeria from where he lived in Florida. I told her she was an idiot to even believe that. When the next package came, I opened it up and looked at the invoice. There was a Florida address and a phone number on the invoice. A quick check on Superpages.com revealed the area code of the phone number in question was in Texas, not Florida. She was like "it's a cellphone". I did the old *69 and called the number. A lady with a foreign accent but passable english answered. As soon as I started talking about the shipment, she hung up on me. I was now worried that stolen property was being sent to my address. I made my roommate get some of the boxes she had recieved. Next, I started looking at the tracking info on UPS. the packages were marked as "left on porch". So no one could claim I signed for them. I said fuck this, I'm calling the stores. I began calling the stores who were shipping the packages. I found a stolen credit card was used for at leat one purchase. Other merchants would not reveal anything and did not even care if the merchandise was returned. Next, I called the local police. They came, did the paperwork and told me just to ship it all back. They came back 1.5 hours later and arrested my roommate. She had already fallen for the Nigerian check cashing scam to the tune of 3500.00. She was already reporting to the court weekly to take drug test and was awaiting trial on the check scam/bank fraud. I knew nothing of this. The police said only "drug addicts" could fall for something so stupid. I kid you not. I guess the fact she was still involved was enough to get her re-arrested. Her sister came and got her stuff. I've not heard from her since. I shipped back what I could, If the merchant did not want it back, I gave it to Goodwill, and got receipts for it.
First off, by the way most 419's work .. the 419'ers in Nigeria think they are taking advantage of people who are already willing to do criminal activity.
.. but I don't think it's right for people to be judging what punishment is appropriate for individuals without knowing the circumstances of the crime.
.. don't pleasure yourself over this. There are far worse and more evil criminals out there who take advantage of innocent people rather than those who don't mind helping some evil dictator get away with their money.
Please think about the design of the scam.
Second, these are people living depressing lives in a country that's pretty screwed up. From their perspective, every westerner is super rich (makes 100 times more than they do).
Why not just ignore the emails? Are you the law to know what's appropriate punishment? How would you like it if your picture was put up on the wbe and made fun of if all you did was speed?
Sure, they did more than just speed
Every crime's punishment takes into account levels of premeditation, intent, etc. So please
Had a 1986 BMW 318 for sale for 1600 bucks on a few online classifieds sites. I hadn't really heard of 419 scams before.
I get an email from a guy saying he wants to buy it and have it shipped to him overseas. He says he's going to send a cashiers check in the mail. I figured, yeah right - this guy is totally nuts, so I ignored him and forgot about the whole thing.
About a week later, a certified bank check shows up via fedex at my apartment for $10,000.
I took it to the state police barracks down the road from my house and asked what to do. They gave me the number of a secret service agent. I asked if there would be any harm (or if I would be doing anything illegal) if I deposited it into an empty account to see if it cleared - they said no.
So I called the secret service agent and explained the situation to him. He said that there have been a lot of fraudulent emails coming from nigeria, but most of them involved scamming people out of their bank account numbers. I asked him if there would be any harm in depositing the check to see if it clears. He said that there shouldn't be any harm in doing so as long as I wait to see if it clears first (duh).
So I did.
A few days later, I went back to the bank and asked them if the check I had deposited had cleared. The teller told me, yes, it cleared. I said "Are you sure it cleared" and she looked again and said "Yes, it cleared the system."
I couldn't believe it.
I told them I wanted to withdraw the money. The teller gets the manager to approve the large withdrawal. The manager checked the system, shook his head and then went into the vault. They gave me 10k in cash and I walked out.
I got home and called the secret service agent back. I said "You're not going to believe this, but I have 10,000 cash in my hand right now. - What should I do??" He said, "Well, the check cleared, nothing illegal has been done, proceed with the transaction." So I had the bank telling me that the check cleared, handing me 10k in cash and a secret service agent telling me to proceed with this transaction.
So I did. I had not witheld any information from anyone. I felt uneasy at first, so I went directly to the police. The confirmed that what I was doing was okay. So I sent about 8,000 via western union to the "shipper" who was supposed to pick up this piece of shit 1986 318.
Three days later the bank account went 10k in the red. There was no way I could pay them back. I explained EVERYTHING to them, emphasizing the fact that THEY had told me that the check had cleared and I acted on that premise. Their response basically was "too bad" and they sent it to a collections agent. I called the secret service agent back. He felt really bad about the situation, but basically said "there's nothing I can do".
I've felt angry, embarrassed, and stupid about the situation ever since. My credit is completely screwed and I don't think there is anything I can do about it.
It's too bad that it took a million dollar scam for them to start going after these bastards.
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http://64.233.161.104/search?q=cache:http%3A%2F%2F www.419eater.com%2Fhtml%2Fhall_of_shame.htm
Sorry about the writing. Robot fingers, you know? Cliff Steele in DOOM PATROL #23
I have personally responded to over 20 of these so called 419 E-Mails and so far I have made over £657,000 TAX FREE. I have researched the subject exhaustively and discovered that although some of the e-mails are indeed sent by fraudsters there are a proportion of e-mails sent by people genuinely in need of help and WILLING TO PAY BIG BUCKS to realise it.
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Caveat: This anser deals with Canadian law, not US.
About 10 years ago, a lady went to her bank with her statement that showed C$10,000 (I think) deposited to her account. She informed the bank that they had made a mistake. She told this to the teller and the branch manager. They both informed her that she was wrong and the money belonged to her. She withdrew the money and put it into another bank. (She also got the names of witnesses to all this.)
Shortly after this, (You know what's coming.) the bank discovered they had indeed screwed up and asked the lady for the $10K. She said, "No!"
Naturally a law suit followed and was fought all the way up to the Supremem Court of Canada. The court declared in favour of the lady, and she got to keep the money.
The principle of law that the Court invoked is (and I paraphrase), "You can't profit from someone's honest mistake, but if you're going to be stupid about it, tough noogies!" The success of the defense against the suit, in other words, turned on the fact that she had done her best to inform them that she was in error. (The witnesses helped to prove that.)
IANAL, certainly IANAAmericanL, but I'd go see an attornery and see if this principle hold in your jurisdiction. Sure as beejezus the bank won't tell you this, and your friend is not a lawyer.
They are the Nigerian elite, so to speak.
Actually, the individuals sending out the messages and responding to baiters are employees of organized crime bosses. They don't own their own computers, nor do they belong to the Nigerian elite. At best they make a commission on the funds they can swindle for their bosses. They're basically telemarketers.
The BBC article this slashdot story is about is unique in that the Nigerian responsible for the swindle appears to be the one who received the $242 million. But it happened in the nineties, when the industry was so young...
Seth
$5 / month hosted VPS on linux = awesome!
If you make a mistake in your little game, they will screw you over royally
Please provide some examples of Americans being physically attacked in America by 419 scammers. It's pretty expensive for Nigerian con men to punish Americans for yanking their chain over the internet. It's much cheaper for them to simply move on to the next mark. What do they have to gain? Revenge, yes. But from a business perspective, they've simply silenced a single crank.
I'm afraid you're not looking at this from an organizational perspective. The folks sending the emails and responding to the cranks are real cheap telemarketers. Labor in Nigeria is super cheap. The people you see in those photos on 419eater aren't nearly as educated as their bosses or the foreigners who persuaded them to take silly photos of themselves. They're being double-team screwed by their bosses and the foreigners. Their bosses aren't going to lift a finger to put the hurt on an American overseas for convincing one of their foot soldiers to bathe in a pool of milk with a goat.
As for that guy from Poland who disappeared, it sounds like he may have confronted the scammers on their own turf. Of course he's going to disappear.
Seth
$5 / month hosted VPS on linux = awesome!
Gather up all the "evidence" you can: bank statements, receipts, mail, emails, etc.
Get all the names to all the cops/Secret Service people you spoke with.
Get all the names to all the bank staff you spoke to.
Get dates/times for as many of the conversations you had.
TAKE ALL THIS TO A LAWYER!
The lawyer will weigh your situation and make a determination as to how to proceed in your best interest.
The bank says you owe $8k. Frankly, that is not a lot of money to them, but to you I'm sure it's quite significant.
One thing I know for sure. If your lawyer even files a dispute, you will owe nothing until the dispute is resolved. Filing is easy. Don't roll over and take this lying down. The bank is playing hard ball in hopes that you simply cave in and feel helpless. If you show some back bone they are going to have to make a cost/benefit analysis as to how much they want to fight for this $8k.
The Bank got screwed too. Bringing the law enforcement officials into this in the context of a legal case may actually put everyone on the same side.
It may also prompt a settlement.
Get a lawyer, play hard ball, but keep an open mind. Your going to have to be the bigger person in this situation.
Oh, and BTW, talk to a lawyer.
Kind Regards
"A few great minds are enough to endow humanity with monstrous power, but a few great hearts are not enough to make us w
Baiter? Or is nobody really that good at it?