"I will eat your dollars." -- Nigerian e-mail scammers

[RebelOne]

http://www.latimes.com/technology/la-fg-scammers20oct20,0,301315.story?coll=la-tot-promo

[ET Awful]

1. To read about the folks that scam the scammers to keep them

busy so they can't scam others: http://www.419eater.com/

[RebelOne]

7. Yes, that's one of my favorite Web sites.

Been visiting it for a couple of years now.

[Kralizec]

9. Cool site. Thanks for the link.

[greekspeak]

2. Nigeria: proof anarchy is not all it's cracked up to be

The things I have heard about that country over the years, from this article, 60 minutes...a strange land of corruption. I never believed that these scam e-mails actually came from Nigeria.

[RebelOne]

4. If you check the headers, you will see that the majority

of them come from Nigeria. Some also come from Great Britain and the U.S.

[greekspeak]

11. I do not actually read the things...always just assumed they were American

in origin. That they are actually from Nigeria actually gives them a touch more credibility. I guess I see a scam or rip off and I think "white bloated conservative American scumbag" and go on my merry way. Certainly I know of Nigeria's chequered reputation for corruption...if it wasn't real it would be downright hilarious. Of course, if America 2005 wasn't real I would be laughing about it too, thinking how absurd that America could be that way.

[unrepuke]

3. Eat my dollars? Makes no cents to me. I will give no quarter, and

frankly, Scarlett, I don't give a dime.

[ComerPerro]

5. Groan

[preciousdove]

6. An inlaws mother is into this...

She lives in another state in her 50's. Her kids are tearing their hair out.

She is probably borderline IQ and she was married to a freelance evangelical preacher so they had nothing for years. He died of complications of diabetes (no insurance) and she stayed in her small Iowa town until she lost her job in the hospital laundry after an injury(her kids all were working in MN) and then moved to a big retirement city in the SW where her parents and siblings had moved.

Her parents got sick and she married someone in a "Christian" dating service who was anything but. Abuse cut it short. Her son went out and got her going on her divorce. Her parents died last year and left her a little money. She got a computer and found the internet and immediately got caught up in this Nigerian scam. Her kids thought they had got her to understand it was a scam but the scammers kept after her and she just admitted she sent them more money. Her kids tried calling her daily but she was online and they couldn't get through and she was ignoring their emails. ("She knew what she was doing. It was an opportunity to be solvent and leave them something").

Short of going and getting her so they can talk to her daily they don't see how they can stop her from giving away all her money to them. She is really a lost soul, but probably not certifiable and when the money is gone she is penniless because she was unable to work. She started working in an insurance office and seemed to be doing well, was promoted but had a nervous breakdown during her parents illness and partly because of office politics she just doesn't understand. She then developed blood clots that put her in the hospital for months from her medicines she was given.

I used to think buyer beware but now I wish there was some way to put these people out of business sooner for vulnerable people like her.

[RebelOne]

8. That's what the people at the Web site www.419eater.com

are trying to do. They work with authorities also to try to put these crooks behind bars. They have been quite successful in having quite a few of them locked up. Plus, they waste their time so that they are not out scamming other people. Check out the Web site.

[jmatthan]

10. I wrote this piece over 10 years ago

Missile of Black Gold

and have saved hundreds of people around the world (US; Finland, Norway, Mexico, etc.) from the scammers!

http://koti.netplaza.fi/~findians/Briefings/Archives/articles.html#Greed-MissileofBlackGold

It was a real-life story. I have a huge number of thankful and grateful emails.

Then the 419 coalition, the Icelandic website, the British website and my then Finnish website co-operated to expose these scammers. However, besides Africa the scam has now spread to China, Britain, Luxembourg, and many other countries. Many novel emails have been created.

However, the factor that makes these scams succeed is GREED!

[Monkey see Monkey Do]

12. Wow -

I had no idea this thing went that far back. Thank you for all the good work you've done.