I know there are lots of internet scams, I was just curious why the 419-style scams were peculiar to Nigeria.
Did choie ever post an update of what became of Fred?
I get them from all over. Not just Africa, but the UK, the Philippines, the Middle East. I don’t know how many of these are just disguised addresses from scammers in Nigeria; Nigerians living in other countries; or copycats in other countries. However, I personally get very few that are purportedly from Nigeria itself these days. Probably the most common country for me is Cote d’Ivoire.
When I worked for a small 10 location sporting goods shop one of the managers called me at the regional office to give me the good news that she had sold her entire inventory of tennis racquest in one day.:dubious:
I pressed her for details and sure enough she was awaiting a check for the 2 dozen raquets at which time she was to ship them all to Nigeria.
She had them all boxed up, addressed, and ready to go.
She felt really bad when I told her to put them all back out on the shelves immediately.
You’re shit out of luck if you’re in Nigeria and you really, actually need something, such as two boxes of tennis rackets.
Or if you’re actually a Nigerian prince and all you need is for someone to send in a check for 1000 US$ so your bank can release your THREE HUNDRED FIFTY NINE MILLION TWO HUNDRED THOUSAND AND SEVENTY FIVE DOLLARS (and fifty cents).
A friend of my family was a Nigerian guy who collected classic cars (he loaned my family a classic Rolls for my sisters wedding). How he is fairing now these kind of scams are so common place I don’t know. I can’t imagine he has much luck getting sellers to return his phone calls.
One of the things you must realize is that many of these scammers work for the criminal rings who are really behind these scams. The people sending the email are merely employees who get a few buck from every scam they can pull off.
Many of them do the humiliating things the 419eaters tell them to do because their boss tells them to, and these aren’t the types of bosses you say “no” to. Many know that they’re purposefully being humiliated, but their boss tells them, if the guy wants a picture of you wearing a dress with a fish on your head, you send him that picture.
What the 419eaters are doing is humiliating the people who are mostly trying to earn a living. You got computer skills in a place like Nigeria, where would you work? Yes, most of the front line workers are scumbuckets themselves who know what they’re doing and mock their victims, but they’re not the criminal rings that are doing the scams themselves.
It’s like the Anarchist I knew who was proud that he threw a few bricks through some Starbucks windows in Washington. I asked him if the CEO of Starbucks was going to clean that mess up or that poor slob behind the counter who is making $8/hour. And, also what happens to the poor slob who is making $8/hr when that restaurant is closed for a few days because of the broken glass.
Being cruel always hurts some innocent bystander.
There’s some old song, I can’t quote it verbatim but here’s the gist: “the world is full of stupid people…”
Why would the big boss order them to do such a thing? Is it likely that complying with such embarrassing demands ever resulted in getting money from the intended victim?
I was just PMed by someone asking for a follow-up to that thread. I’ll post it now. Yes, there’s new data that indicates “Fred” is still leaping into the abyss of his own victimhood. Sigh.
I am that librarian. Haven’t seen him in a while, come to think of it, but up to a couple months ago he was still driving to Charlotte to pick people up on their way from Nigeria.
I kind of wonder about that myself. Howabout if you’re some well-to-do businessman in Nigeria and want to get something mail order from the United States, what do you do?
I guess we’ll read all about it in this thread.
Was this particular anarchist into anti-globalization graffiti ?
If so, we’re only two degrees of separation from one another…
Yeah, this whole thing has got to be a huge drag on legitimate Nigerian business and trade. What do you do when everyone believes your entire country is a scam?
Oh, you’ll get the THREE HUNDRED FIFTY NINE MILLION TWO HUNDRED THOUSAND AND SEVENTY FIVE DOLLARS (and fifty cents). It’ll merely be in Zimbabwean dollars, and it’ll be worth about USD 0.00004.
Perhaps Banditos by the Refreshments?
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Was the California gold rush profitable? For a few miners yes, but most miners didn’t make a mint. The people who sold equipment to the miners though made fortunes. In Nigeria, a lot of mugus never make that big score.
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I suspect on a per hour basis, Russians make more money. But their romance scams tend to operate at a higher level of sophistication (and reflect greater education and worldliness).
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419 scams are industry. Industries often persist in geographic and ethnic clusters. Nigeria is an ethnically diverse state: IIRC the Obos (some of them) are heavily into the 419 stuff. Here’s another example from the above-board economy:
There was nothing special about Dalton, Georgia to begin with. But over time the region built up the physical infrastructure, social connections and technical skills to dominate the market. Anybody starting up a new carpet business would be able to tap into a pool of skilled labor in Dalton, and anybody with those skills wouldn’t have to necessarily relocate if they were laid off. Success begets persistence.