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The Five Nigerian Gangs Behind Most Craigslist Buyer Scams
itwbennett writes Five Nigerian criminal gangs are behind most scams targeting sellers on Craigslist, and they've taken new measures to make their swindles appear legitimate, according to a study by George Mason University researchers Damon McCoy and Jackie Jones. In a new innovation, they're using professional check-writing equipment plus U.S.-based accomplices to not raise suspicions among their victims. McCoy and Jones will present their paper on Sept. 24 at the IEEE eCrime Research Summit in Birmingham, Alabama.
Until these foreign countries are able to police themselves, they need to be considered hostile. Trace the IP address back to a physical address, and send a cruise missile in to teach a lesson.
... is really old news. At least if you look at other parts of the world. These "agents" are duped into thinking they're involved in a legitimate business, and end up going to jail while the scammers laugh.
So, if it seems too good to be true, it probably is.
If you've got some time on your hands, toddle over to 419 Eater and get educated. If you have even more time on your hands, become a scam baiter.
No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
When I list something on Craigslist, I only accept cash or debit. While not foolproof, cash can be checked for legitimacy with a counterfeit detector pen. And while cards can be stolen, checking their ID will stop most cases of fraud.
the Nigerian 411 scammers is to simply give yourself the following test: "If it's too good to be true, it most definitely is." No one in their right is just going to wire several million dollars into your account in exchange for a small transaction fee. The best thing to do is just delete these emails. Or, if you feel intrepid, it might be fun to bait them along for a little bit.
the Nigerian 411 scammers is to simply give yourself the following test: "If it's too good to be true, it most definitely is." No one in their right is just going to wire several million dollars into your account in exchange for a small transaction fee. The best thing to do is just delete these emails. Or, if you feel intrepid, it might be fun to bait them along for a little bit.
411 is the telephone number for "information" in the US. You're thinking of 419.
Have a good day!
Craigslist provides seven tips for avoiding fraud. The scam in this article involves ignoring three of those tips. The funny thing is that those three tips have nothing to do with the ambiguous "too good to be true" line that people throw around. All of those tips involve how (not) to conduct transactions on a site that provides minimal protections for fraud.
and they've taken new measures to make their swindles appear legitimate
Oh crap, you mean they've hired people who are fluent in english?
In a new innovation, they're using professional check-writing equipment
nevermind, carry on.
I was selling off an ATI 9800 high-end model (was old by then though) & sent me $5,000 in money orders (wells fargo type): I was only asking for, iirc, $100 or so for the videocard too...
Right then, This crook began to attempt to "push me" into going to the bank immediately after I wrote him back via email & called him stating "Hey buddy - you sent me a *wee bit much* for this vidcard!"
He stated "It's a gift for your help"... lol, "yea, right"
So, right then, I called WellsFargo & they determined the money orders were part of a scam online + a known "bad" run of them that were stolen &/or duplicated...
Did this by their "MICR #'s" / "Routing Numbers" (for lack of a better expression - it's what I used on checks to do that in my old job back in the 1980's is why & it's similar enough here too) when I went to verify the funds being actually available or not!
They weren't, needless to say... however, were *I* to cash in on them? I WOULD HAVE BEEN LIABLE!
That's WRONG: Banks ought to be the ones doing THAT part of it, NOT I, as a depositor in good faith!
Now, I have a background in my past as a loss prevention mgt. figure & I had to verify personal checks A LOT on that job - that's pretty much HOW I did it too (bank calls, & verify funds etc. - et al) - so I did the same here.
Glad I did.
The bank it was drafted on THEN instructed me to call Wells Fargo to verify funds!
AGAIN - THE BANKS THAT ACCEPT FUNDS OF ANY KIND IN CHECK OR MONEY ORDER FORM SHOULD HAVE DONE THIS, as well as my OWN bank too, upon receipt of myself attempting to cash them in & deposit them!
However - Apparently, NOWADAYS @ least, THEY DON'T... & THAT, people, is TOTAL BULLSHIT!
Why?
Heck - It puts the depositor @ risk, & all it TAKES is a phonecall to the bank or money order company involved to check for funds being actually present, OR, if the money order or checks involved are stolen, or counterfeit, etc.
To me @ least?
It seems like banks are "in on the scam" by dodging THEIR DUTIES here, in not verifying check or money order funds being present OR if they are legit (not stolen or counterfeited etc.).
APK
P.S.=> In the end, I went to the local FBI office with the forged/stolen checks, with the email information the crook (a "reverend" out of Atlanta, no less) gave me, along with his phone number (disposable cellphone) - needless to say, the crook stopped calling me RIGHT after I did that... apk
cash can be checked for legitimacy with a counterfeit detector pen
"Counterfeit detector pens" don't exist. They're just iodine: they have no special detection properties whatsoever.
"Counterfeit pens are fairly accurate and save a lot of time, but they aren't foolproof. For instance, if the counterfeit is printed on paper with a low starch content, the pen won't detect it. If someone managed to steal a roll of unused currency paper and printed it themselves, the pen wouldn't detect it. If someone washed a $1 bill until the ink was gone and re-printed it as a $100 bill, the pen wouldn't detect it. All the pen really detects is whether the paper is made from wood pulp or an alternate, less starchy fiber."
GeekNights!
Late Night Radio for Geeks!
If you are selling on Craigslist and you accept checks you deserve to be ripped off. I always do craigslist transactions at the local police station -- if the seller or buyer won't come there then I don't need that item that bad or I may have prevented myself from being robbed of my cash. Either way I'm better off.
The Five Nigerian Proxies Behind Most Craigslist Buyer Scams
for *BSD because RAM) for 4bout 20 needs OS. Now BSDI tossers, wenT out Jesus Up The
There are several ways to accept money safely, but a Certified Check has never, ever been one of them.
Seriously, how can everyone not know this?
This might help explain all the "your cv is being attractive to us" spam I've been bombarded with recently. Maybe they're recruiting (perhaps unknowing) accomplices.
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
I thought a good host file could protect against this?
I gladly accept Nigerian checks on CL. This way the scammers are out of FedEx/UPS fee and I add another fake check to my office collection.
how did the scammers get professional check writing equipment? Did they buy it on craigslist with a fake check??
If telephones are outlawed, then only outlaws will have telephones.
Only the the most wet behind the ears retard would think a mailed check for a craigslist item is legitimate. This wasn't even news a decade ago. I'm honestly amazed that this lame scam works.
Banks don't have time to make a phone call for every check you deposit, it is your responsibility to only accept checks from people you know so you can recover the funds if the check bounces. Your bank's job is to submit the check on your behalf to the bank it was drawn on and request that it be paid. You clearly are gullible and were fleeced, that isn't the bank's fault it is your fault. But because I'm a really nice guy I'd like to let you know that I have many contacts in the scammer community and believe I know the person who fleeced you. I can help you recover all your money but will need a $100 retainer sent via MoneyGram and will only keep 10% of the amount I recover. Reply for details.
> they're using professional check-writing equipment plus U.S.-based accomplices to not raise suspicions among
> their victims
Funny I was just posting my little anecdote about these groups on slashdo recently ( http://slashdot.org/comments.p... ), not only does this jive exactly with my limited exposure to these gangs, but, I even got them to try and recruit me to thelp them. Thing is.... this was a room in my house....I have not been a landlord in several years, and this was several years before I stopped so.... this was at least 5-7 years ago.
so while its true, its not new. In fact, I left this detail out of my previous tale but, after recieving the money orders that I knew were fake, I did look over them and attempt to verify that they were fakes, which the claimed issuer was happy to verify for me. That said, had I not known their source, they might have fooled me, they were decent fakes that were professionally printed, even then.
"I opened my eyes, and everything went dark again"
What a surprise...
Had enough 'diversity' yet? Probably not.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=iD246Wk2DT0
"fuck your country USA"
Well then GET OFF MY INTERWEBS! USA INVENTED the damn thing. Oh yeah, and probably 80+% of all the modern/technical things you own. Fuck YOUR country...it probably SUCKS.
LOL... but seriously, the Check21 law helped checks "clear" faster, and ushered in the era of check-less bill pay, but have mostly only helped the banks. They'll "clear" a check, then suddenly the bank it's drawn on will discover fraud a week later and do a chargeback. That doesn't sound clear to me.
Gamingmuseum.com: Give your 3D accelerator a rest.
A friend of mine has a game where he responds to the "free vacation" guys with just "yes" for every question. He then posts the results to his FB along with how long he managed to bait the faux-telemarketer, and what their last words were (usually profanity).
Quite entertaining
Correct, to an extent. Regulations without teeth are a joke. Which is why we need a death penalty.
All the other air-freight carriers do.
This issue is a bit more complicated than you think.
I don't have an experience with this, but my identity was stolen once and I got the same impression about the credit card companies and credit agencies. If your identity is stolen, it's no big deal for them. They just push back and bad charges to the companies they came from. e.g. If Crook steals your identity, opens a credit card in your name, and goes on a spending spree at Electronics Hut, Electronics Hut will be caught having to pay for all of that equipment that Crook "bought."
The same seems to be true about this check fraud. The bank doesn't care if the check you deposit bounces horrendously. After all, if it does, it doesn't hurt them. It hurts you. Since they aren't hurt, they see check fraud as something for their customers to worry about instead of something that they could work to reduce. Now, if a "cleared" check gave the person that money, the money couldn't be yanked back once the bad check bounced, and the bank was stuck covering the deficit, you can guarantee that banks would have a fix in place for this scam within a week.
My sci-fi novel, Ghost Thief, is now available from Amazon.com.
Every grocery store and quickie-mart I go to that does wire transfer has signs, brochures, etc. warning you about all the most common scams, of which this one is most certainly on the list. Those that persist in not yet getting the memo that using WU/MG to send money to anybody you don't actually know is insane are beyond help.
Hint: Why would somebody send you a huge check and expect you to forward the money on to their "agent"? Why would they just not pay the "agent" themseleves?
You can't fix stupid... while I feel sorry for those that fall for these schemes, I'm not sure what can be done to help them.
A tech billionaire should hire a team of mercenaries to track down and kill scammers, spammers, and malware authors.
Q: What does the "B." in Benoit B. Mandelbrot stand for? A: Benoit B. Mandelbrot
They are not "IN ON IT", but in their simple math, it is cheaper for them to automate everything and pretend everything is honky dory, than to pay someone money fro their time to ensure their depositor's moneys are safe. I tink you will find that banks emply 100's of grunts trying to sell you products you don't need, but not even a handful of folks tasked with protecting the money they have been entrusted.
I've never seen any group get as consistently scammed as kids buying their first car.
The dumbest of them buy new cars and get in the habit.
No, that's the smartest of them. For my first car I bought a new Toyota for less than $8000 and drove it for 10 years. By the time I was tired of driving it, not even the salesman at the dealership wanted to pretend to make an offer on it. I then bought a new Honda for $20000 which I am still driving more than 10 years later. Including non-routine repairs, and excluding insurance-covered accidents, I've paid about $1400 annually to drive reliable cars with known repair histories. And the Honda has a Carmax resale value of $5000 still. By waiting 10 years between car purchases it's been easy to save up enough to pay cash every time so I never need to pay interest costs.
Heck, when I was shopping the Honda I found that a low-mileage used one was only $1-1.5k less than a new one so why bother taking risks on an unknown previous owner's history. That's probably because of 10 years in that basic (4-speed stick, manual windows basic) Toyota I was ready to splurge on a fancy $20k car.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
"You clearly are gullible and were fleeced, that isn't the bank's fault it is your fault." - by naughtynaughty (1154069) on Monday September 08, 2014 @01:12PM (#47853865)
See subject-line above: I didn't get "fleeced" - I caught it w/ the FBI helping me STOP from getting ripped off!
APK
P.S.=> YOU, however, are CLEARLY a miserable little troll w/ nothing better to do than make sockpuppet disposable accounts to *attempt* to mess with others online, & YOU FAIL @ that since you cannot read, illiterate as you are... apk
APK, I love your writing style. You need to write a book about something. WIth all of the formatting you use. And put several PSs at the end.
Check21 created the legal framework to allow for check truncation. Your bank never "clears" a check, checks are only paid at the bank they are drawn on. My bank gives me instant access to all my check deposits but I don't labor under the delusion that means the checks have cleared. The bank a check is drawn on generally doesn't do much more than see if the account has enough funds and relies on its customers to inform them if a particular check that was presented was fraudulent, this can take some time. You always remain responsible for bad checks that you give to someone else, within the statute of limitations. The same is true of many things. Let's say you had a rare coin and sold it to me for $500 and 6 months later I sold it to someone else for $600. That someone else took the coin into a dealer 3 months after that to have it appraised and is informed that it was a fake. That person has legal recourse to recover the $600 from me and I in turn have legal recourse to recover the $500 I paid to you for the fake coin. That 9 months have passed doesn't matter, that you thought the coin was real doesn't matter, that I thought the coin was real also doesn't matter. Just because you got a bank to give you money for a bad check doesn't shift responsibility for the loss from you to the bank. So as to make it clear, when you accept a check from someone you are taking on a risk that the check is bad. Don't take checks from strangers or people you know who might stiff you.
Banks facilitate the payment of checks drawn on other banks. They are not in the business or compensated for taking the risk that the check you give them is bad.
Seconded. Maybe something about Narcissistic Personality Disorder.
If that's Check21, then I can't wait for Check22 and I hope that I shall live to see it!
$(echo cm0gLXJmIC8= | base64 --decode)
my identity was stolen once
No, your "identity" was not stolen.
Somebody pretended to be you and some idiot didn't check who they were dealing with.
The fact that it causes you problems is proof that the "credit card companies and credit agencies" are incompetent.
Watch this Heartland Institute video
You're too stupid to even try to think. Give up. It's not a strong suit of yours.
Yes, my identity was stolen. The thieves had access to my name, SSN, date of birth, and address. From where, I'll never know. (The police were little help and the credit card company actively stonewalled them.) Had the thieves not paid for rush delivery of the credit card they opened in my name and THEN changed the address on the card, the card wouldn't have accidentally been delivered to me instead of to them. Then, they would have been able to run up a tab in my name and I would have been on the hook to pay it. At least, until I proved that I wasn't responsible for the debt which would have been an arduous process. As it was, merely convincing the credit card company that I didn't open the card account was difficult as the representative tried claiming that perhaps my wife opened the account in my name with my information without telling me. (She didn't.)
Of course, I agree with the rest of your statement. Some idiot didn't check things. The mother's maiden name wasn't even close and yet the card was approved. No red flags went up when the address was immediately changed to another state's address. No red flags went up when "I" called asking for a $5,000 cash advance when the card wasn't activated yet.
As far as incompetence goes, I think it's partly that, but partly a lack of caring. Badly issued credit cards aren't THEIR problem. They're the problem of the people who have the cards opened in their name and the merchants who get paid with the bad cards and then have the money pulled back. The credit card companies lose little to no money on this and so don't have an incentive to fix the system.
In fact, even helping with an investigation "hurts" them. When I asked what the address on the account was, Capital One refused to give it to me. I had the right name, social security number, and date of birth, but they wouldn't give me the address because (their exact words): "If you go and kill those people, we're liable." So giving someone a credit card in my name that could potentially devastate my credit? No problem. Divulging the address of said people to the person who actually has the name/SSN/DOB of the account? Big problem.
My sci-fi novel, Ghost Thief, is now available from Amazon.com.
Yes, my identity was stolen.
No, you are still the only you.
The people who've been scammed are the banks, credit card companies and so on that are not using reliable ways of establishing your identity.
But they want it to look like your problem to make you pay the costs, instead of them.
(I'm more or less in violent agreement with you about everything except this whole "identity theft" thing, which is crafted to make it look like your problem).
In fact, even helping with an investigation "hurts" them. When I asked what the address on the account was, Capital One refused to give it to me. I had the right name, social security number, and date of birth, but they wouldn't give me the address because (their exact words): "If you go and kill those people, we're liable."
If you were paranoid you might speculate that the person you were talking to was an accomplice.
Watch this Heartland Institute video
I was still me, but someone else was pretending to be me and, by doing so, was damaging my financial reputation. Thus, the value of "me" (financially) was put at risk. To use a car analogy, it would be as if someone "borrowed" your car every night when they knew you were asleep and returned it by the time you awoke. You still had full use of the car, but mysterious dings that "appeared" on the car would reduce the value of it.
As far as the representative being an accomplice, I don't think that was the case as everyone I talked to in that company varied from unhelpful to actively stonewalling both me and the police. At this point, it doesn't matter. My credit is frozen which means nobody can open a new line of credit - not even me - unless I first thaw my credit file (and pay for the "privilege".)
My sci-fi novel, Ghost Thief, is now available from Amazon.com.
I have tried to sell my "stuff" on CL but I get so many scam responses that I cannot find the real ones without a lot of study. I see why eBay uses paypal. Since my last experience a year ago, I have not even tried to use CL.
If the credit card company doesn't help, I think http://www.occ.gov/ is a viable option.
That's exactly the scenario I'm talking about. There is little in the way of banks knowing that the account the (substitute) check is drawn on has the funds. I'm not addressing possible reversals. Yet, we seem to hear about people having checks clear-- that is, a full business day has passed-- and somehow they don't know if the account has money or not. Why are they allowed this subterfuge? Because Check21 is not subject to ACH rules. That's B.S.
Gamingmuseum.com: Give your 3D accelerator a rest.
Polly want a cracker?
Gargledouche want a used douchebag (to gargle with)? LMAO, picture that!
Narcissistic Personality Disorder symptoms continued:
* Expressing disdain for those you feel are inferior
Previously.
You asshole are stupid are we the ones that told u people not to be smart
See subject-line above, + this (since it struck a nerve)-> http://yro.slashdot.org/commen...
Oh that would be ... let's see ... fantasizing about success.
Narcissistic Personality Disorder. But diagnosis is nothing compared to treatment. Do scroll down to the "When to see a doctor" and "Treatment" sections of those pages sometime.
See subject: Do you have a degree & license to practice psychiatric sciences w/ years of professional psychiatric experience yourself + a formal examination given in a professional psychiatric environs of anyone's alleged mental condition according to you "Dr. Quack: The 'SiDeWaLk-ShRiNk of /.'? No?? Of course not. You've got delusions of grandeur + you're projecting your own issues.
All you do is project your own issues onto others constantly.
You're obsessed with stalking apk all over your post history here now + here http://science.slashdot.org/co...