I overheard someone at work say that four Nigerians were found to be responsible for the notorious e-mail scams of the last few years and that they are now in jail. Has anyone else heard this and if so, have you a news link? I’ve had a cursory look at CNN and see nothing.
Good. because they owe me LOT of money.
There is a guy from Nigeria who lives in my building. He is attending the masters in accounting program at the university here. I never thought about it until now, but hmmm…
(he really is a good guy though. Or so it seems)
A tip of the iceberg I’m afraid. The only plus side is that all the true idiots out there have already fallen for it.
If you’re implying there’s any constraint to the number of true idiots in the universe, I’m afraid I’ll have to differ with you.
Sailboat
So all those billions of emails and thousands of scams were coordinated by 4 guys? Those are are some hard working Nigerians!
sigh
Point. Sailboat.
Four is news? From the way I here it, scamming’s their signature black market industry over there (you know, like how China’s got their bootlegging). There’s a vigilante UK-based website featuring scammed scammers who utlize a 1-900-esque toll number that they get marks to call (I can’t remember what that number is for the UK, so I can’t tell you what site that is, right now). Anyway, there are way more than four scammers on that site.
From the linked article:
It was not so much underreported as no longer news. Lots of scammers. Lots have already been caught. Lots more still plying their “trade.”
Nigeria is to scams what the Midwest is to grain. A new crop will be coming up soon.
When I get a chance to find it, I’ll post the article about what it is like to walk into a Lagos Internet cafe – apparently row after row of guys are industriously spamming away. Four? That’s not even a rounding error. It’s my understanding this is the third biggest constituent of Nigerian GNP.