What Would You Do?

I wanted to share the following link with you.  The show What Would You Do sets up scenarios and sees if people will jump in to assist.  The one that aired last night had a segment on Nigerian Scams.  The producers of this show actually had contacted me some time ago because they wanted a scam victim to speak with, but we were not able to find one that was willing to speak with them.

You can watch the video of the episode at

http://abc.go.com/watch/what-would-you- … you-do-225 

or read the transcript at

http://abcnews.go.com/WhatWouldYouDo/woman-falls-online-nigerian-scam/comments?type=story&id=12981644 

I would also encourage you to leave your comments on the topic at the link with the transcript.

Pot Calling the Kettle Black

As I opened my email this morning, the news items opened up and I had to take a second look at the title of this article . . . Nigeria Charges Dick Cheney in Corruption Case Stemming From Halliburton Bid.  My first thought was this is like the pot calling the kettle black!

In the article it states

An anti-corruption unit in Nigeria has charged former Vice President Dick Cheney in an alleged bribery scheme dating back to his days as CEO of Halliburton, the huge oil services company.

Halliburton and other firms are accused of paying as much as $180 million in bribes to win a contract to build a $6 billion liquefied natural gas plant in the African country’s southern delta, the Associated Press reported Tuesday.

Okay . . . $6 billion is a LOT of money, but depending on which agency or report you look at, that is just a drop in the bucket to the amount lost by people to the scams and fraud coming out of Nigeria.  There are some reports that would show that $6 billion is not even one full year’s work for Nigerian scammers.  Add to that the fact that many people do not report scams out of shame, and the true dollar amount just keeps getting higher and higher.

Back to the article . . . it goes on to say

Nigeria’s Economic and Financial Crimes Commission pointed specifically at a former Halliburton subsidiary, Houston-based KBR, which pleaded guilty last year in U.S. federal court to authorizing and paying bribes in Nigeria for plant contracts between 1995 and 2004.

If you go to the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission’s website you will see on the About EFCC page this information . . .

The preponderance of economic and financial crimes like Advance Fee Fraud (419), Money Laundering, etc has had severe negative consequences on Nigeria, including decreased Foreign Direct Investments in the country and tainting of Nigeria’s national image. The menace of these crimes and the recognition of the magnitude and gravity of the situation led to the establishment of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC). The legal instrument backing the Commission is the attached EFCC (Establishment) Act 2002 and the Commission has high-Ievel support from the Presidency, the Legislature and key security and law enforcement agencies in Nigeria.

My words to the EFCC . . . how about you go and clean up the crime, corruption and fraud in your own backyard before you start pointing fingers at others.  You have an office in Lagos, Nigeria which is the scam and fraud capital of the world.  How about making a REAL difference by shutting down the scam and fraud rings, and locking up the people running them so that they cannot just go out and open up a new location.

 

MoneyGram and Nigeria

On June 8th, 2010 MoneyGram released the following information. Because I feel so strongly about this topic, I would like to share the entire press release with you, along with my personal thoughts on it.

MINNEAPOLIS, Jun 08, 2010 (BUSINESS WIRE) –MoneyGram International (NYSE:MGI), a leading global money transfer company, announced today that First Bank of Nigeria Plc has selected MoneyGram to provide money transfer services in its more than 500 locations across the nation. First Bank, established in 1894, is Nigeria’s oldest bank and one of the largest in terms of network size. First Bank has locations in all key cities including Abuja, Benin, Lagos, Iabdan, Port Harcourt, and Warri as well as a significant presence in rural Nigeria, some operating 24 hours a day, seven days a week, making MoneyGram services even more convenient for Nigerians.

Is this really what we need?  for Money Gram services to be even more convenient for Nigerians?  I feel that it is pretty convenient for them just as it is.  Actually it is way TOO convenient for them to pick up money that people receive from counterfeit cashier’s checks, or for fake Secret Shopper jobs or that people believe that they are sending to someone within the United States.

“MoneyGram, which has operated in Nigeria since 1998, saw significant growth between 2006 and 2008 when it tripled its network in the country,” said Vicky Johnston, MoneyGram’s senior regional director for Anglo Africa and Middle East. “We are excited about partnering with First Bank as it is MoneyGram’s most recent and significant expansion which will allow us to provide a service to so many more people through the bank’s large number of branches.”

Ironically, during the same time period that MoneyGram increased it’s network in the country, the number of money lost to scams and fraud also increased.  You can see the increase on the chart below which is from the Annual Report put out by the Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3.gov)

To commemorate the agreement with First Bank Plc, MoneyGram’s Chairman and CEO, Pamela H. Patsley is in Nigeria and will attend the official launch event scheduled for today. During her visit, Patsley will address the media as well as CEOs of MoneyGram’s agent banks in Nigeria, discussing the common goal of bringing needed financial services to the people of Nigeria and the growth opportunities there.

I have a better idea . . . what about discussing the common goal of fighting all of the scams and fraud that pass through MoneyGram every day, and how they can do more to save those customers from becoming victims.  Before we start looking at the financial needs of the people of Nigeria, I think we need to protect the financial needs of the people right here in the United States. 

“MoneyGram is pleased to partner with First Bank,” said Patsley. “Our partnership will help to ensure that our services are accessible and convenient for the people of Nigeria and that we can continue to meet the growing demand of consumers in this important remittance market.”

And why are their demands growing?  Because there are more and more scams going undetected or people just turning a blind eye to them. 

Nigeria, Africa’s most populous nation, is ranked in the top 10 receive countries for money transfers. The World Bank estimates that $10 billion USD in remittances was sent to Nigeria in 2009 – with the United States being the primary send country. Other top send countries include Canada, Germany, Israel, Italy, Liberia, Libya, Malaysia, Spain, South Africa and the United Kingdom.

That is because Nigeria is also ranked in the top 3 countries for money wire transfer scams.  The other countries would be Canada and the United Kingdom, who are also ironically on the list above.  I wonder hom much of the $559.7 million dollars from the chart above that went out of this country in scams is directly a part of the $10 billion reported to be going into Nigeria in 2009? 

With the First Bank agreement, MoneyGram now has a total of eight bank relationships, thus further proving that MoneyGram is dedicated to providing reliable and safe money transfer services to Nigerians – wherever they may reside. Furthermore, agent banks in Nigeria have brought a positive experience to the remittance business with their individual pedigree in banking, service quality delivery and branch network, which provides a sense of ease for those receiving funds from family members working in other countries.

So we are going over and above to make sure that Nigerians have a reliable and safe money transfer service, but we are doing very little to offer that same kind of safety to the MoneyGram customers in the United States.  The last sentence in the above paragraph really gets me . . . . which provides a sense of ease for those receiving funds.  Why is it that we seem to care more about the people in another country, who are one of the main sources of these scams, than the people here in the United States that they are scamming? 

Shawn Mosch
Co-Founder of ScamVictimsUnited.com
 
Find us on Twitter, Facebook and more through
http://www.retaggr.com/page/ShawnMosch

Sign our petition for Scam Education and Awareness Programs at
http://www.change.org/petitions/view/create_scam_education_and_awareness_programs

A little humor

Another member of our message board told me about the “You might be a Nigerian scammer” list on EbolaMonkey.com, and I wanted to share parts of it with you.

You might be a Nigerian Scammer if . . .

YOU WRITE IN ALL CAPS.

You refuse to use spell check and think that Courier is the only font in the world.

You hate Americans.

You confuse American last names with first name. Ex. Smith Adam or Williams Brian

When someone asks you for a picture, you look for the nearest magazine. (or modeling website)

You always put DR. in front of your name, no matter what the situation. Even if you are not a doctor.

You become extremely angry when you catch someone lying, even though everthing about you and what you are doing is a lie.

You have trouble keeping your lies straight.

You introduce yourself as a Prince or a King.

Your father or husband was a Nigerian General.

The new President of Nigeria is seeking vengence on your family because your father or husband confirmed a life prison sentence on him when he was in charge.

People around you tend to get assassinated, poisoned, or killed in a plane crash.

You write in the most contrived, archaic, and atrocious English.

You try to capitalize off human misery (e.g. mutilations in Sierra Leone, the September 11th attacks)

You have $25-$100 million dollars just laying aroundatrocity

You address everyone as “friend” or “dear”

Everything is “confidential.”

You are a prestigious International Banker and you have a Yahoo or Hotmail email address. Even if you are trying to be secretive, the best you can come up with is a yahoo email address because you aren’t smart enough to log into register.com and register a fake domain name.

You are an ex-general who got converted to Christianity and now wants to make amends to God by sending a stranger the $ 25 million you stole from your country.

You are the wife of the deceased state employee whose husband stole all this $11, 000,000. but got converted to Christianity before his death and wants you to “invest it all in Christian work in the US to make amends for his sins against God.”.

A contract was over invoiced/overcharged by $25 million and the money is now “floating” in a suspense account at the Central Bank of Nigeria under your sole control.

You have resolved to share 35% of your fortune with a complete stranger for taking absolutely no risk whatsoever.

You are The Chairman in charge of Minting and Printing at Central Bank of Nigeria and you control the Nigeria Remittance Office. Not only can you supply any document needed to prove these funds exist, you can also print any document needed to authorise release of the funds to a complete stranger.

All you require to make someone rich is YOUR NAME, COMPANY`S NAME, ADDRESS , TELEFAX NUMBER. YOUR BANK NAME ,ADDRESS, TELEFAX NUMBER. YOUR BANK ACCOUNT NUMBER AND BENEFICIARY NAME.

You are a high official at Nigerian Petroleum holding on to millions in over-billings.

You have a motorcycle for sale on EBAY for an extremely low price and your will to ship it for free for a small deposit of $2000.

By some strange coincidence You and your trusted barrister and/or other associate always read and write your emails mere minutes apart on the same computer.

You are a destitute political refugee living in a camp on the boarder of some country, but you still manage the daily trip to a cyber cafe in Logos, Nigeria in order to check your email.

When you get caught trying to scam someone, you use the “I’m doing this because the white man robbed me and made us Africans slaves” excuse. Even though you have no idea of the ethnicity of the person you are robbing, disregarding the possibility that you could be stealing from someone who has African ancestry.

You pose for a photo with a loaf of bread on your head

-dont know what these mean:
Ivannastiff Kockupmianus
Iama Dildo
Bendme Overand Dome
I Love Juanking
Will U Phystme
Iblowdudes
Anita Cox
Humpin Bois
Butt-Plugg

You “monitor” emails rather than read them.

Need money urgently so your child can have an vital operation tomorrow, for weeks.

Work for a African bank and can rip them off with just a USA bank account and $200.

Ask a stranger to help you secretly rip off a bank etc.

————–

It starts with an email . . .

Here is a typical email that could show up in your inbox and start you down the path of becoming a scam victim if you don’t know what to look for.

Subject: You Have A Package

From: Brenda.Kellen@marshall.k12.mn.us

Reply To: info@fedexdelivery.com

You have a bank draft of $580,000.00 USD , which await the outstanding payment of $95.00 Contact our dispatch unit for dispatch immediately. Contact person: Mr. Celin Smith, Email: fdexcourierdeliveryltd01@gmx.com Tell: +234 807 363 6733

How do I know that this is a scam from just this small amount of information? Let me show you.

First, they tell you that you have a large amount of money just sitting there waiting for you, and all you have to do is just send them some money and they can release these funds to you.  This is used in inheritance and lottery scams on a regular basis.  If you really did have a large amount of money owed to you, and the only thing holding that money from getting to you was some sort of payment, they could take that payment from the amount owed and just send you your money.

Second, there are WAY too many email addresses going on in this email.  There is the one in the From line, which is probably spoofed or this person could have had their email account hacked into.  We will talk about spoofing and hacking later on this week.  Then there is a different email address in the Reply To line, which includes the term FedEx, but is not a legitimate FedEx extension . . . a simple Google search verified this.  Then, within the email there is a third email address, again with terms referring to FedEx, but if you look they are on the front part of the email address, the part after the @ is from gmx.com which is a free email service.  With free email services the person setting up the account has full control over the letter that appear before the @ in the email address.  I could go and create one right now that said WaltDisney@(insert free email service here) but that does not mean that the people who I am emailing are getting emails from Walt Disney.

Third, look at the phone number provided . . . Tell: +234 807 363 6733 . . . that is WAY too many numbers to be a United States phone number.  Another Google search tells me that 234 phone numbers are from Nigeria, and Nigeria is the number one country of these types of scams.

So what have we learned today?  Google is our friend, look at the email address and see if it is a free email service, and check your phone numbers.

Scam mentioned in popular television show

Does anyone watch the show Medium, about Allison DuBois who works for the DA’s office and can see and hear people who have died and can pick up on things? Allison DuBois is a real person, and her gift has helped to solve many cases.

On the show this week her daughter Bridgette who also has this gift, runs into a man in the library using the computer every day. He is dressed as an African prince, or at least that is the way that he appears to the girl. She sees the name that he uses on an email account, and when her older sister is later complaining about the spam emails and mentions the same name Bridgette tells the family that she knows this guy and that he comes to the library all of the time. They family tried to tell Bridgette that it is a scam, and that he is just pretending to be a Prince with a lot of money and that in his emails he asks you to give him some money to help him get his money out of the bank that it is in.

(sorry . . . you have to watch the short ad in order to see the clip)

http://www.cbs.com/primetime/medium/video/?pid=PZ0y0OFCCF2PbXcIi99LXoQH_TH8ELKv&play=true&vs=Default

So, the next day Bridgette sees this guy at the library again and gives him all of the money she has (about $30 I think . . . remember, this is a girl in grade school) and she says he can take it to help him get his money and then he just has to pay her back when he does get her money.

http://www.cbs.com/primetime/medium/video/?pid=Q1RsJ3iRt54UApw_UgIwdgqydbwTMibS&play=true&vs=Clips

The man later returns to the library to give Bridgette her money back saying that he cannot take money from a little girl, and that he had only been doing this type of thing for a few weeks. Don’t we all wish that THIS part happened in real life!

I do think it is great that they are getting the word about the Nigerian scams out into the popular television shows. This one episode could have helped to educate a lot of people that this is a scam.

http://www.tv.com/medium/dear-dad-…/episode/1317709/summary.html?tag=ep_guide;summary

Nigerian government – or lack there of

I was reading the article at http://www1.voanews.com/english/news/africa/nigeria-yaradua-react010410-80560327.html about the Nigerian government and Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the man who attempted to bomb a plane on Christmas Day.

In the article it talks about how the Nigerian President was rushed to Saudi Arabia for treatment of heart problems over a month ago. Here are a few quotes from the article.

“Even when you have a president in place in Nigeria, he has to work 24/7 to contain the infighting and intrigues that are around. When you have no president in place, the problem is just compounded. So there’s no doubt about it, that Nigeria is under virtual no-management at this point,” . . .

“While Nigerians generally do not condone this sort of thing and will not participate in this type of thing, the President of Nigeria himself was a fundamentalist who implemented Sharia (Islamic law) in his state. So it is this type of extreme positioning that the politicians have done, whether for political reasons or elections or whatever, that has created the climate where some people will go to the fringe extreme,” . . .

there’s no real leadership coming from the Nigerian side of the divide that is addressing this issue head-on,” . . .

I would like to say that not only is no one from the Nigerian side addressing THIS issue, but no one from the Nigerian side is addressing OTHER issues that can only be controlled by the Nigerian law enforcement and government, such as the topic of scams and fraud. And who can really say that none of the money going into Nigeria from these scams and fraud is going to fund events like this bombing attempt or other future terrorist attacks. But for some reason, the Nigerian law enforcement and government turns a blind eye to this.

Shawn Mosch
Co-Founder of ScamVictimsUnited.com
Find us on Twitter, Facebook and more through
http://www.retaggr.com/page/ShawnMosch

Nigerian man attempts bombing

This week I blogged about the Nigerian man who attempted to blow up an airplane on Christmas. http://scamvictimsunited.blogspot.com/2009/12/nigerian-national-charged-with.html

This event brings up something that I have not really talked about for 6 years, because I did not want people to think that I was trying to start some conspiracy theory . . . where is all of the money from these internet scams going, and could some of them be going to fund terrorism? I have read that Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the Nigerian man who attempted this bombing, is the son of a rich Nigerian banker, so he comes from a wealthy family and that is most likely how he had the money to fund his bombing attempt . . . but he also said that there were other like him, training to do the same thing that he did . . . how are those “others” getting the money to fund their training and the attempts that they may make? Every person that Umar knows that is training to learn to bomb the United States cannot be from a wealthy family . . . they have to be getting their funds from someplace. Isn’t it possible that the Internet Scam that we talk about on ScamVictimsUnited.com and this blog could be the resource for the money to fund these attacks? (We KNOW it is not going to pay for further education of the scammers on proper English, otherwise their emails would have gotten better by now.)

This is why I have felt for years that one of the ways that we could fight terrorism is to change the way we handle counterfeit cashier’s checks. If we make it harder for them to get the money to fund these attacks, then we will decrease the number of them that they can fund and go forward with.

Shawn Mosch
Co-Founder of ScamVictimsUnited.com
There is strength in numbers!

Find us on Twitter, Facebook and more through
http://www.retaggr.com/page/ShawnMosch

Support Scam Victims United by shopping at
http://shopittous.blogspot.com/

Another scam victim arrested

A while back I told you about a scam victim who was arrested. Stories like these always frustrate me because as a former scam victim I know the hurt and pain that you go through when you find out that you have been scammed, but these victims have that feeling plus more because they now have been arrested. They do not just face the financial recovery process that people like myself went through, but they also have to hire a lawyer to prove that they are the victim in the case and not the criminal. What happened to innocent until proven guilty?

This victim was also responding to a Secret Shopper ad.

Here is the story of this latest scam victim in her own words . . .

I responded with all the requested information the next day. Shortly after I responded to this email I was asked by a local company to come into their office for an interview. I did and became very hopeful that I would get the job. I totally forgot about even responding to the Mystery Shopper email and wasn’t really expecting to hear anything from them. I few days later I received 2 Money Gram money orders @ $998.00 each sent to me via Fed Ex overnight mail. No other documents were inside. I couldn’t figure out where these came from and was not even thinking about that one email response I sent for the Mystery Shopper position. I had read an email in my AOL inbox a week or two before that I was a part of a class action lawsuit against AOL for some “footer” issue. I assumed these checks may have been a result of the class action suit since I had 2 screen names with AOL. I attempted to call Money Gram and went online and could not get any information regarding the tracking numbers on them. NO ONE EVER EVEN MENTIONED POSSIBLE FRAUD. When I went to the Money Gram station at the local Lucky store (in the town I have lived for 34 years and am now raising my 13 year old son) to cash these money orders I was arrested immediately. I was frisked, my car searched my purse emptied all in front of the Lucky store here in the quaint little community where most people know everyone. The 3 responding officers were absolutely sure that I was some check fraud “ring leader!” They would ask me where the money orders came from, I would answer telling them that they were sent via UPS next day air but I was unsure by who. Then I was told to shut up and stop lying. One officer told me “you and I both know no one sent these to you. You made these yourself” I was then “escorted” to Alameda County Jail where I remained for the next 10 hours until my $10,000.00 bail bond (for check fraud) was processed.

Once released from jail I made it my mission to catch this dirty rotten scum bag who was responsible for what I had been through. So…..I responded to an email that he had sent to me (which I didn’t even open until about 2 days after I was released from jail) indicating that he sent the package and instructions and he needs me to follow through with this task immediately (of sending his payment via Western Union) I played along with this guy to try to obtain as much information as I could. I advised him that the money orders were cashed and to please call me as I was a bit confused about something regarding his instructions. He called, about every other minute from that moment through the next 4 days. Once even forgetting to *67 therefore I was able to obtain his NIGERIAN telephone number. He even went so far as to send me text messages!!! He thought I had his money and he wanted it. I recorded our phone conversation on my MAC I MOVIE. I tracked down the gentleman whose email address they had hacked and were using to send the initial correspondence. He lived in S. Africa and was the administrator of a fishing forum. I explained to him my situation and advised him to contact the FBI before they contacted him as I had already given them his email information on my FBI report of this incident. He was grateful that I had taken so much of my time to track him down and explain this situation to him so that he could cancel his email address they were using before they had sent any further damaging money orders out to innocent people. I thought that since the local police didn’t really care about catching these losers that I would!!

I have since retained a very good lawyer. We have met with the DA who still is unsure whether he plans to file charges against me or not. I appeared in court last week and at that time there were no charges filed yet BUT THE CASE WAS NOT DROPPED EITHER!!! I go back to court November 5th.

Ever since this happened I cannot STOP talking about it. It helps for me to get past the anger. Initially, I was consumed by researching scammers, trying to catch this guy and others like him. Then I realized that law enforcement officials are inexperienced and unequipped to handle situations like mine. They are not interested in catching the people responsible and therefore I needed to direct my ager somewhere else and for that reason, I would love to tell my story in hopes to make people aware of these scammers.

Know your codes

Here is one way to know if a person is trying to pull a fast one on your . . . check and see if their area code matches up with where they say they live. If they are calling from a landline, and they tell you that they are in a certain state, just check here to see if their phone number matches up with where they say they are.

If you go to http://www.whitepages.com/area-codes they make it really easy for you. There is search box where you can enter an area code, and they will tell you what city and time zone that area code is connected to. That would be another good way to check on someone . . . if you have their phone number, ask them what time zone they are in, and then check their answer with that search.

You can also enter a city or a state, and it will search and tell you all of the area codes that would be found in that area.

For international calls, you can go to http://www.countrycallingcodes.com/ and enter the country that you want to call and it will tell you the numbers you would need to dial.

Since many of the internet scams today come out of Nigeria, look for a phone number with a Country Code of +234 http://www.countrycallingcodes.com/country.php?country=Nigeria

Shawn Mosch
Co-Founder of ScamVictimsUnited.com
There is strength in numbers!

Find us on Twitter, Facebook and more through
http://www.retaggr.com/page/ShawnMosch

Support Scam Victims United by shopping at
http://shopittous.blogspot.com/