Do you know someone who fell for a Nigerian scam?

paygep

oh I just remembered a funny one! my cousin was getting emails from a Nigerian guy... he was purchasing items online "couldn't ship them directly to his country" and if he could ship them to her house he would then send her a check to pay for her to ship the items to him ... well the items started showing up at her house... they were really weird things too, like pornos, women's rave costumes, and lingerie... well before she got his check, the cops showed up at her house one day! they explained that fraudulent credit card transactions had paid for the items that had been shipped to her house! ... they confiscated the items and she gave them all her correspondence with the guy... LOL

one that amuses me, I get periodically, is that my business has won "best of your city award" and if I would send $150 I could have my plaque printed and sent to me! and I've never won anything in my life!!!

Sabine_Stroehm

My friend's uncle fell for a different one. This guy Jim said he was stuck overseas, someone robbed him, stole his phone, ticket home etc... needed money to get home and he'd pay him back once he got back to the States. Well, this uncle had a friend Jim who went on vacation with his wife to a country in Europe and was expected home in the next few days. He tried calling Jim's international number, no response so he assumed it was legit and sent the money. Well, Jim and his wife came home a few days later talking about the lovely trip they had and this uncle was out a good few thousand dollars.

I got one of those supposedly from a guy who despises me and would NEVER ask me for money. I had to laugh...

Sharon_C

I've always wanted to answer these emails and string people along but I'm afraid to.

bkthandler

I work in banking so I get them addressed to me and for clients.

I always laugh since even if it wasn't a scam (and I know they are) what they are generally asking me to do is illegal and will get me fired.

The worst one was a beneficiary's e-mail got hacked. I knew instantly from the grammar and syntax that it wasn't my client but she was overseas at the time and ended up dealing with all of this.

Alluminati

I've always wanted to answer these emails and string people along but I'm afraid to.

I did it. I was bored at work.

Ruzuki

I get calls sometimes from 'Microsoft' or 'Dell' wanting to help me 'update' my computer and I string them along for a while being like "How do I turn this on again?" and "How do I open the internet?", and eventually I am like "Oh someones at the door can you call back?" and they're like "sure" and I never hear from them again. XD

Both me and my friend almost fell for apartment rental scams very recently. We were both looking and found someone renting, and gave us photos of the place and wanted us to send them the first months rent and deposit, but couldnt show us the apartment personally because they were out of state.
In my friends case, she was suspicious, went to the address she had been given for the place and knocked. Of course, they were not renting.
My case was about a month after my friends, and having heard from her that she almost got scammed I was immediately suspicious when he said he was out of state and couldnt personally show me, and googled the pictures he had sent me. They were ALL over craigslist in tons of different states. Same exact pictures.

I dont know anyone who actually fell for one, though. Most of my friends/coworkers who arent as familiar with the internet or computers ask me if they get suspicious emails, since Im the 'techie'. My coworker was actually going to send money but she mentioned it to me and I was like 'No thats a scam dont do it!" Luckily they believe me if I tell them that. XD

dbanks80

Bump for later. These stories are interesting

habit365

I knew a 20 something couple who fell hard for one of those Nigerian prince scams. They sent several thousand dollars, and somehow ended up losing their house because of it (not sure why, maybe they were sending money that should have been paying their mortgage and couldn't get caught up?). I was really amazed that they had never heard of that kind of scam before.

Missjulesdid

We knew a guy in his 50's and a little of a social outcast so not much action. We'd heard he'd met a girl on fb the previous yr and got scammed. Now, he was doing it AGAIN! Would tell us all about his African princess who loved him and was going to marry him (BTW the pics of this girl were late 20's and gorgeous. Ya ok)She even "married" him. Changed her last name on fb to his etc. She always needed more money before she could come be with him. We used to tell him, and we'd get soo angry! Not only at her but him for falling for it again? I was almost like "you deserve to lose money!" I haven't spoken to him for awhile but last time I checked he didn't have fb anymore so maybe he learned the hard way again.

HOW? I mean HOW do you develop a relationship with someone and "marry" them without verifying their identity? I was watching Dr Phil, and there are people on there who fell in love and sent tens of thousands of dollars without even seeing the person on webcam. HUH? I mean I actually DID marry an African man I met online. I bought a ticket and TRAVELED to Africa and met him and his family and we are now married and living together in Africa. If you "love" this person enough to send your life savings to him/her, then why can't you buy a ticket to go meet them?

Spnneil06

i'm pretty sure my room mate is still in the middle. wires money each paycheck! He won't listen, never talked on the phone, all email...sad!

dbanks80

"I accept your proposal,i will provide you my credit card to charge for the sum of $5,176 plus the extra credit card company charges and AFTER THE FUNDS CLEAR INTO YOUR ACCOUNT you will deduct the sum of $2,500 as a deposit and send $2,500 via money transfer to the initial owner of the house once the initial owner has the $2500, he will make the keys and authorization letter available to you to start work the extra $176 is for the money transfer service after work is complete you will charge my card for the balance let me know when you are ready for my credit card details"

Needless to say, he did not roof this house!

Yeah that sound like a scam way too convoluted!

ew_david

We knew a guy in his 50's and a little of a social outcast so not much action. We'd heard he'd met a girl on fb the previous yr and got scammed. Now, he was doing it AGAIN! Would tell us all about his African princess who loved him and was going to marry him (BTW the pics of this girl were late 20's and gorgeous. Ya ok)She even "married" him. Changed her last name on fb to his etc. She always needed more money before she could come be with him. We used to tell him, and we'd get soo angry! Not only at her but him for falling for it again? I was almost like "you deserve to lose money!" I haven't spoken to him for awhile but last time I checked he didn't have fb anymore so maybe he learned the hard way again.

HOW? I mean HOW do you develop a relationship with someone and "marry" them without verifying their identity? I was watching Dr Phil, and there are people on there who fell in love and sent tens of thousands of dollars without even seeing the person on webcam. HUH? I mean I actually DID marry an African man I met online. I bought a ticket and TRAVELED to Africa and met him and his family and we are now married and living together in Africa. If you "love" this person enough to send your life savings to him/her, then why can't you buy a ticket to go meet them?

When people are desperate for love, they'll do just about anything.

Missjulesdid

We knew a guy in his 50's and a little of a social outcast so not much action. We'd heard he'd met a girl on fb the previous yr and got scammed. Now, he was doing it AGAIN! Would tell us all about his African princess who loved him and was going to marry him (BTW the pics of this girl were late 20's and gorgeous. Ya ok)She even "married" him. Changed her last name on fb to his etc. She always needed more money before she could come be with him. We used to tell him, and we'd get soo angry! Not only at her but him for falling for it again? I was almost like "you deserve to lose money!" I haven't spoken to him for awhile but last time I checked he didn't have fb anymore so maybe he learned the hard way again.

HOW? I mean HOW do you develop a relationship with someone and "marry" them without verifying their identity? I was watching Dr Phil, and there are people on there who fell in love and sent tens of thousands of dollars without even seeing the person on webcam. HUH? I mean I actually DID marry an African man I met online. I bought a ticket and TRAVELED to Africa and met him and his family and we are now married and living together in Africa. If you "love" this person enough to send your life savings to him/her, then why can't you buy a ticket to go meet them?

When people are desperate for love, they'll do just about anything.

But that's what's so confusing.. IF you're so much in love, wouldn't you BUY A FREAKING TICKET and go meet this person? My ticket to Africa was just $748 round trip. If you have thousands and thousands to send this person who is supposedly the LOVE of your life, then why you can't fork over 700 bucks and a few days of your time to meet them face to face????

Janautical

Actually yeah, I do. My future mother-in-law was scammed on a dating website. She lost $5000. She was totally blinded by her emotions that she didn't see that it didn't make sense that he would need the money from her. It's really awful the lengths they'll go to trick older women who are looking for love.

Sharon_C

I've always wanted to answer these emails and string people along but I'm afraid to.

I did it. I was bored at work.

Did anything interesting happen?

ew_david

We knew a guy in his 50's and a little of a social outcast so not much action. We'd heard he'd met a girl on fb the previous yr and got scammed. Now, he was doing it AGAIN! Would tell us all about his African princess who loved him and was going to marry him (BTW the pics of this girl were late 20's and gorgeous. Ya ok)She even "married" him. Changed her last name on fb to his etc. She always needed more money before she could come be with him. We used to tell him, and we'd get soo angry! Not only at her but him for falling for it again? I was almost like "you deserve to lose money!" I haven't spoken to him for awhile but last time I checked he didn't have fb anymore so maybe he learned the hard way again.

HOW? I mean HOW do you develop a relationship with someone and "marry" them without verifying their identity? I was watching Dr Phil, and there are people on there who fell in love and sent tens of thousands of dollars without even seeing the person on webcam. HUH? I mean I actually DID marry an African man I met online. I bought a ticket and TRAVELED to Africa and met him and his family and we are now married and living together in Africa. If you "love" this person enough to send your life savings to him/her, then why can't you buy a ticket to go meet them?

When people are desperate for love, they'll do just about anything.

But that's what's so confusing.. IF you're so much in love, wouldn't you BUY A FREAKING TICKET and go meet this person? My ticket to Africa was just $748 round trip. If you have thousands and thousands to send this person who is supposedly the LOVE of your life, then why you can't fork over 700 bucks and a few days of your time to meet them face to face????

Well, when they never tell you where they actually are or are "always traveling for work" it's kind of hard to buy a ticket. My point was (at least in the two cases I posted about), there was no rational thinking involved because these two people thought they found their soulmates. They thought they were helping a loved one.

Jelaan

Well no, but apparently we won the Spanish lottery once. Got a letter on "official " crested letterhead and everything. We just had to call their number to confirm our information -or so the letter said. Problem is, we have never played any Spanish lottery. Gave us a good laugh anyway.

dunnodunno

I work in retail & honestly I'm surprised at how many people fall for these Nigerian scams or send to people in countries that you can tell they never had any direct contact with a day in their life

I had a lady one day say she wanted to send $11,000 dollars to someone in South Africa, because she had a check that was put in her account to cash at her bank.

michael1976_ca

I've never fallen for it but it's not just Nigeria. russians do alot to entice you in through email then when your hooked it's i need money. I've given up

RedArizona5

Wait. Wait... It's a SCAM??? I'm not actually going to get that $785,000.....??? Nothing good ever happens to me. :sad:

BUAHAHAHAHA