posted on July 18, 2002 09:28:37 AM new
Have you received your request from a Nigerian Friend to help him remove ill gotten gains from his homeland? Generally they offer 20% to 40% of the money for allowing them to send 50,000,000 or so into your bank account. If you have not gotten one, welcome to the internet! We all know these are scams, but what you probably don't know is that there are people out there who respond to these "people" and lead them on wild goose chases. They send them to the Lagos International Airport at all hours of the day and night to meet them when they come in to sign for the money (of course, the person being conned never shows up). These exchanges are sometimes great fun to read. If you have some free time, check out http://www.scamorama.com/ This is the one of the best pages for this. http://members.optusnet.com.au/~leek2/index.html is from a very nice gentleman from Australia. His sight is one of the funniest around. Has anyone else taken the time to play with these cheese heads?
posted on July 18, 2002 09:32:48 AM new
I invited them to do a test deposit in an account in the Turks that automatically forwards anything in it but they were too smart. It is hard to scam a scammer but you should try as a public service.
posted on July 18, 2002 09:37:28 AM new
I've received those requests by snail mail regularly when I was posting classified ads in mass circulation magazines (1992-1996). The requests were always very poor quality photocopies and the typing was very bad.
I never understood why anyone would be taken in, but they obviously were or else the mailings wouldn't have continued as the postage costs would have added up. The scammers have switched to e-mail in the last 5 years.
posted on July 18, 2002 10:34:33 AM new
The postage costs may not have been as high as you thought. A fair percentage of the mailings used poor quality counterfeit stamps. The scammers were complete scoundrels.
posted on July 18, 2002 11:51:00 AM new
been getting them on fax for years.....i even know of someone who spent money on a lawyer checking it out he said stay away complete SCAM
posted on July 18, 2002 11:58:50 AM new
Well, in truth I don't have ANY sympathy for any victims of the scam. They believe that the money they are going to receive is illegally gotten and that's fine with them.
Oklahomastampman: That's an interesting point about the stamps. I never thought of that. Of course, I have no idea what a genuine Nigerian stamp looks like, so I would easily be fooled.
Irene
[ edited by stockticker on Jul 18, 2002 12:00 PM ]
posted on July 18, 2002 01:34:44 PM new
You have to check out some of the sites, some of the people who lead the scammers along are really funny. There was one guy who got a nigerian to send him $3 US by DSL to prove it was an honest deal (eventually they told him that they spent it on beer and had a good laugh at his amazing stupidity). Another one had the scammers wait for her in front of a drug store. They didn't know there was a web came in the drug store window, so there are pictures of these guys on the internet. Very Very funny stuff.
Of course, I have no idea what a genuine Nigerian stamp looks like, so I would easily be fooled.