Do you know someone who fell for a Nigerian scam?

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Replies

  • LeslieTSUK
    LeslieTSUK Posts: 215 Member
    I used to contact them,
    just for fun
    had the bank scam ones
    had the hotel abroad with a deposit needed
    had the lost my luggage and passport one,
    also had one scam where they had a girl chat on yahoo messenger saying she was held up at a dive motel and was stranded, she was really believable too, then as she gave bank details to do a transfer of money I was like mmmm, why it not to you?
    I wasn't 100% sure she was a scam so passed all the info I had to the local police to pass on just incase.

    but most scams can be back traced in google search since it caches every page it ever comes across.
  • jessicapk
    jessicapk Posts: 574 Member
    I ran into one from OK Cupid. He was in New York but travelled between there and Georgia, where I live. He was doing great and seemed legit for a while. He was head over heels and I got super suspicious once he started sending these long messages that had quotation marks either on the end or the beginning. I googled the messages and they were standard Nigerian scammer mess. I kept playing it for a while for fun and then he suddenly had to go to Africa for work. His laptop got damaged at the airport, he ended up losing his ticket, and then, the final straw was when he went to a charity event, told them that I would donate money, then got upset with me that I wouldn't donate, like I was personally hurting him. Kudos to them for creativity!

    This one was a new one on me. I knew the Nigerian scammers were everywhere but I didn't expect them to break into the housing / roofing market. I work in roofing material sales. Recently, one of our contractors was dealing with someone who was out of town and claimed he needed his rental house roofed. This is actually common but the way the guy wanted to do it was another story. The actual e-mail is below. The contractor sent me a copy of the e-mail to ask my opinion and a huge red flag flew up on this one!

    "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!
  • shellma00
    shellma00 Posts: 1,684 Member
    Didnt read the rest of the responses, but I worked in banking for almost 15 years.. try convincing these people that they are going to be falling for a scam and they dont want to believe you.

    ends up causing many fees and headaches for the customers
  • Sabine_Stroehm
    Sabine_Stroehm Posts: 19,263 Member
    A friend lost about 5k to one.

    It was along the lines of the ones that end up on craigslist where they want to rent your apartment and only have one check, please take first/last months out and send them the rest.... then the check bounces....
  • NotShena
    NotShena Posts: 172 Member
    I had a friend who fell for a scam on a dating site. The "lady" he was talking to conned him into $500 for a plane ticket to go see him. Poor *kitten*.
  • kristen49233
    kristen49233 Posts: 385 Member
    Not a Nigerian scam, but a couple of months after my brother passed away last year my dad received a phone call from my nephew (his grandson). The "grandson" told my dad he has been in an accident, was in trouble, and he needed my dad to wire him some money. When my dad asked him why he didn't sound like "grandson" he said he had a cold. Fortunately my dad (who is in his late 60's) called me first before doing anything. I checked around and confirmed it wasn't my nephew who had called him. I think the scammer must have gotten all the information he needed from my brother's obit and was able to search my dad's name & location to get his phone number.
  • rml_16
    rml_16 Posts: 16,414 Member
    Not a Nigerian scam, but a couple of months after my brother passed away last year my dad received a phone call from my nephew (his grandson). The "grandson" told my dad he has been in an accident, was in trouble, and he needed my dad to wire him some money. When my dad asked him why he didn't sound like "grandson" he said he had a cold. Fortunately my dad (who is in his late 60's) called me first before doing anything. I checked around and confirmed it wasn't my nephew who had called him. I think the scammer must have gotten all the information he needed from my brother's obit and was able to search my dad's name & location to get his phone number.
    That's a really common one!
  • HazelMcNutty
    HazelMcNutty Posts: 85 Member
    I once got a second friend request from my mother's old high school friend (she was already on my list) without even really thinking about it I accepted) Instantly she was messaging me. Apparently she was stuck in cuba (She actually HAD gone down there for a wedding) and needed money to help her get out... IT was pretty convincing but the only thing is, my Facebook name, as with my MFP name, is NOT my real name. This person kept referring to me as Hazel. Took me all of about five minuted to figure out what had happened. I then went through every person on the fake profile's friends list and messaged them to let them know it was a scam. Took me about two hours to get them all. By the end of it I had about 10 or 15 people message me back incredibly thankful because they were just about to wire money to their friend they thought was stuck. After posting tons of "This isn't the real person, this is a total scam profile" messages on their wall that account was deactivated soon after. :)
  • Sabine_Stroehm
    Sabine_Stroehm Posts: 19,263 Member
    I had a friend who fell for a scam on a dating site. The "lady" he was talking to conned him into $500 for a plane ticket to go see him. Poor *kitten*.
    I had a family member who fell for that one.... ouch
  • MasterBroshi
    MasterBroshi Posts: 108 Member
    I had someone call me a few weeks ago and said that I got a government grant for $9,000. All I had to do was give them my bank account number.
  • scrapalooza
    scrapalooza Posts: 335 Member
    There are just so many scams out there & for just $19.95 I will get you a list of them all.
  • Marbella29660
    Marbella29660 Posts: 71 Member
    No but I know someone who fell for an American one. Boo!
  • srslybritt
    srslybritt Posts: 1,618 Member
    There are just so many scams out there & for just $19.95 I will get you a list of them all.

    How many easy payments of $19.95 is that? And does that include S&H?
  • rml_16
    rml_16 Posts: 16,414 Member
    I had someone call me a few weeks ago and said that I got a government grant for $9,000. All I had to do was give them my bank account number.
    If I gave these people my account number they would be incredibly disappointed.
  • SassyCalyGirl
    SassyCalyGirl Posts: 1,932 Member
    I worked as a Fraud Investigator for a credit union for 5 years. Countless people (insert stupid ) fall for this ****.


    If you never visited Nigeria-then you didn't win the Nigerian lottery. Simple as that!
  • bookworm_847
    bookworm_847 Posts: 1,903 Member
    yes, working in banking we see it way too often. that an the overseas military scam where they find you on a dating site and ask for money in order to "come home". I even know a moron who's fallen for it more than once!!!!!

    This actually happened to my husband right after he got back from Iraq. Thankfully, he told the girl no. She said she was stuck in a hospital in Mexico, and they wouldn't let her leave until she paid her bill. And ya know, it's the darndest thing, but he didn't hear from her again after that.
  • Jerseygrrl
    Jerseygrrl Posts: 189 Member
    I've been working in law enforcement for 20 years. They happen ALL THE TIME.
    People want so badly to get that quick fix, the fast money, that fairy-tale ending. And for every person who wants that, there are 100 of them ready to take advantage.
  • JenAndSome
    JenAndSome Posts: 1,893 Member
    Going through some things of a family friend that passed I found several receipts for Western Union transfers to somewhere in Nigeria along with emails from a 30 something woman claiming to be in love with this 80+ year old man and talking about how she cannot wait until she can afford to come to America and be with him. It was very sad really. He had Alzheimer's and the scammers probably got a couple hundred thousand out of him. Apparently my ex had conversations with him about how it was probably a scam, but he was convinced and couldn't be talked out of it.
  • paulawatkins1974
    paulawatkins1974 Posts: 720 Member
    I cant imagine anyone actually falling for the type I get almost daily in email form.They usually open with "hello dear" ????
    Yes! I have gotten "hello dear" emails lol. Didn't know what it was about just deleted without reading.
  • Julesbait
    Julesbait Posts: 190 Member
    Not personally. But my husband is a cop, and made a run to a woman's house because she fell for one and wanted to report it. The real kicker to this....she's a professor at a university.
  • yopeeps025
    yopeeps025 Posts: 8,680 Member
    I just do not know what to say about some people.
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  • FitFitzy331
    FitFitzy331 Posts: 308 Member
    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.
  • neandermagnon
    neandermagnon Posts: 7,436 Member
    with the lost/stuck/stranded stories the best advice is to get them to go to the embassy for advice, or even offer to call the embassy for them with details of their location. It's very easy to get the contact details of embassies online and if someone is contacting you online asking for money, they can just as easily contact their embassy.

    thing is, if you offer practical advice to people who are asking for money, if they're genuine, the practical advice helps. (and this really is the best way to help a friend stuck in a foreign country) If they're a scammer they'll turn down offers of practical help, especially when you start talking about calling embassies about them.

    nowhere near on the same scale but when I used to live in London you'd get people who'd ask for money to go towards a train ticket to get to a homeless hostel....... yet if you ever offer to buy them the ticket, they disappear pronto.
  • runner475
    runner475 Posts: 1,236 Member
    Sadly it is probably the older generation that doesn't understand as well.

    You kidding me ! You think it will happen to that group who won't miss their voting rights. OHHH! No! do not underestimate that badass generation. They are Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles in disguise.
  • paygep
    paygep Posts: 401 Member
    LOL YES! My co-worker actually deposited the check in her account!!! Luckily she mentioned it to us at work... but we just couldn't believe she fell for it! It was all taken care of by her bank before anything really bad happened. I guess that's not that exciting of a story...
  • Breakdown64
    Breakdown64 Posts: 22 Member
    I did it, now I'm like the king of Nigeria. Go figure!
  • T1DCarnivoreRunner
    T1DCarnivoreRunner Posts: 11,502 Member
    I almost did... several years ago: I was selling my fridge on Craigslist. A guy emailed me and was interested. We emailed back and forth a few more times, and he eventually said he trusted my description and that he was going to ask his movers to pick it up.

    I wasn't clear how or when he was going to pay for it, and I wasn't going to let it go until it was paid for... so I received a DHL package with a corporate check for $10,000 (I can't remember, we had agreed on $200 or something like that). I am an accountant and have seen this type of thing before - someone gets the design and account numbers for corporate checks and starts printing their own checks that look alike and forging signatures. So I contacted the company, and as I suspected, they were already aware of the issue. The FBI was already investigating their case, and I gathered as much information as I could to send to them (emails, info from the DHL package, etc.).

    The person who had sent me the check asked that I cash the check and send $9,000 to this other person (who was likely an innocent 3rd party used to launder money before part of it eventually ended up back in a thief's hands) and keep $1,000 for my troubles, but he was sorry that he wasn't going to be able to pick up the refrigerator (big surprise, eh?). Of course, I did not cash the check or send any money to anyone else.

    A couple weeks later, I got a call from a Nigerian phone number wanting to know about the money. The guy had a heavy accent and I could only understand half of what he said. Of course, I sent the number off my caller ID to the victim company so they could pass it on to the agent in charge. My guess is that they never got anywhere with that case regardless - it is hard to track these things.

    I ended up selling the fridge to someone locally who had rented a garage a couple hours away near a stadium - they were going to use it as a beer fridge for tailgating.
  • paulawatkins1974
    paulawatkins1974 Posts: 720 Member
    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.
  • Oscarinmiami
    Oscarinmiami Posts: 326 Member
    my brother is still giving his "girlfriend" in Nigeria money every month...he is an idiot he has sent over $20,000 already! He says he loves her and she loves him....mind you she is blonde with blue eyes living in Nigeria...dumbass!