The Stupidest Nigerian Scam

Have you ever received an email in your inbox from a so-called Nigerian, a scam saying that their uncle, the prince of some country, died, and they want to send you money? Well, here is a story from the heart of their operation. 

 

The Nigerian Scam

 

They call it Nigerian emails since most of the ideas behind these scams originate in Nigeria. Not saying all scams are from Nigeria, but the emails with the dead uncle, or prince, or whatever– those ideas came from Nigeria nationals, and other people have adopted them. Now, in Thailand, the big scam is with a few Nigerians pretending to be rich foreigners that want to date Thai girls. Then, something happens, and they ask the Thai girl to send them money. There are many Nigerians in Thailand prisons, some are here for real business, and some for crime. 

Nigeria is the capital of Africa

When I had my Internet shop in Thailand around 2001, I had many Nigerians coming into my shop writing Nigerian scam letters. Sometimes all the computers were busy with just Nigerians, or Africans, as they call themselves, because most of them used Africa and Nigeria interchangeably.
Whenever they come to call they would say, “Call Africa now.” My reply would of course be, “Where in Africa?” His reply: “Africa.” After a while, a guy from Ghana explained to me that some Nigerians thought themselves as kings of Africa, and that Nigerians are better than other Africans. They never said,”Call Nigeria,” since there is only one country in Africa as far as they’re concerned, and that’s Nigeria. I quickly learned that when they said that, I simply put in the code for Nigeria. 

Some of these Nigerians used our overseas call services, and actually called their victim from the shop. The people that wrote the letters never call, they just give his contact to another higher up in the scam hierarchy, and he will make the connection, and redirect to his contact in that country. One day I spoke with one of the guys, Joe, a Nigerian national, that more or less lived in my Internet shop.

 

 

 

 

 

Brother Joe wants to send you money

I started to talk to Joe and listen to his stories, and I mentioned a free website for sending free faxes instead of emailing. He checked it out and started using it, but after one day of using it he got furious at me. Telling me he wasted money in my shop, and my free fax does not work. I said the free fax works, but maybe it was a problem on where he sent them and what he was writing?

In short, he wrote something like this

Dear Sir!

My name is Brother Joe

I have for the last year now sold 100 kg of Heroin in Thailand and I want to move the money to Hong Kong. I found your company through a business associate. If you like to help me move the money from Thailand to Hong Kong, please contact me at email princejoe@*****.com,

I did not know where to go so I could laugh my head off! This guy Joe actually believed that anyone would answer him, and wanted to accept and move drug money from Thailand. I kindly told him that his story was crazy, and that the free fax service worked, but his story did not. The punishment for drugs in Thailand is death, and in Hong Kong it is similar punishment; nobody would reply to him. He left angry, and I did not see him for about two months. At that time, he came back in a new suit, with a fat roll of dollar bills. I guess he changed his story and finally hooked a sucker.

 

 

 

 

 

Helping another brother out

If you get a letter from Joe, or any other person claiming to have loads of money to give you, or maybe want to congratulate you for a 10 million dollar lotto prize, you should forward your letter to this guy, Mr. Mike, the owner of 419eater.com. He spends 7 hours a day writing back to these criminals, and he even has photos of them on his website. He thinks the more time they spend with him the better, they have less time to write to you and me. 

If you want to read more about Nigerian scams and Nigerians in Thailand you can check out the posts in the link.

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