So the Nigerian scams really are ran out of...Nigeria?

SykkBoy · 08-06-2005

http://apnews1.iwon.com//article/200...=home&SEC=news

LAGOS, Nigeria (AP) - Day in, day out, a strapping, amiable 24-year-old who calls himself Kele B. heads to an Internet cafe, hunkers down at a computer and casts his net upon the cyber-waters.

Blithely oblivious to signs on the walls and desks warning of the penalties for Internet fraud, he has sent out tens of thousands of e-mails telling recipients they have won about $6.4 million in a bogus British government "Internet lottery."

"Congratulation! You Are Our Lucky Winner!" it says.

So far, Kele says, he has had only one response. But he claims it paid off handsomely. An American took the bait, he says, and coughed up "fees" and "taxes" of more than $5,000, never to hear from Kele again.

Festac Town, a district of Lagos where the scammers ply their schemes, has become notorious for "419 scams," named for the section of the Nigerian penal code that outlaws them.

In Festac Town, an entire community of scammers overnights on the Internet. By day they flaunt their smart clothes and cars and hang around the Internet cafes, trading stories about successful cons and near misses, and hatching new plots.

Festac Town is where communication specialists operating underground sell foreign telephone lines over which a scammer can purport to be calling from any city in the world. Here lurk master forgers and purveyors of such software as "e-mail extractors," which can harvest e-mail addresses by the million.

Now, however, a 3-year-old crackdown is yielding results, Nigerian authorities say.

Nuhu Ribadu, head of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, says cash and assets worth more than $700 million were recovered from suspects between May 2003 and June 2004. More than 500 suspects have been arrested, more than 100 cases are before the courts and 500 others are under investigation, he said.

The agency won its first big court victory in May when Mike Amadi was sentenced to 16 years in prison for setting up a Web site that offered juicy but phoney procurement contracts. Amadi cheekily posed as Ribadu himself and used the agency's name. He was caught by an undercover agent posing as an Italian businessman.

This month the biggest international scam of all - though not one involving the Internet - ended in court convictions. Amaka Anajemba was sentenced to 2 1/2 years in prison and ordered to return $25.5 million of the $242 million she helped to steal from a Brazilian bank.

The trial of four co-defendants is to start in September.

Why Nigeria? There are many theories. The nation of 130 million, Africa's most populous, is well educated, and English, the lingua franca of the scam industry, is the official language. Nigeria bursts with talent, from former NBA star Hakeem Olajuwon to Nobel literature laureate Wole Soyinka.

But with World Bank studies showing a quarter of urban college graduates are unemployed, crime offers tempting career opportunities - in drug dealing, immigrant-trafficking, oil-smuggling, and Internet fraud.

The scammers thrived during oil-rich Nigeria's 15 years of brutal and corrupt military rule, and democracy was restored only six years ago.

"We reached a point when law enforcement and regulatory agencies seemed nonexistent. But the stance of the present administration has started changing that," said Ribadu, the scam-busting chief.

President Olusegun Obasanjo is winning U.S. praise for his crackdown. Interpol, the FBI and other Western law enforcement agencies have stepped in to help, says police spokesman Emmanuel Ighodalo, and Nigerian police have received equipment and Western training in combating Internet crime and money-laundering.

Experts say Nigerian scams continue to flood e-mail systems, though many are being blocked by spam filters that get smarter and more aggressive. America Online Inc. Nicholas Graham says Nigerian messages lack the telltale signs of other spam - such as embedded Web links - but its filters are able to be alert to suspect mail coming from a specific range of Internet addresses.

Also, the scams have a limited shelf life.

In the con that Internet users are probably most familiar with, the e-mailer poses as a corrupt official looking for help in smuggling a fortune to a foreign bank account. E-mail or fax recipients are told that if they provide their banking and personal details and deposit certain sums of money, they'll get a cut of the loot.

But there are other scams, like the fake lotteries.

Kele B., who won't give his surname, says he couldn't find work after finishing high school in 2000 in the southeastern city of Owerri, so he drifted with friends to Lagos, where he tried his hand at boxing.

Then he discovered the Web.

Now he spends his mornings in Internet cafes on secondhand computers with aged screens, waiting "to see if my trap caught something," he says.

Elekwa, a chubby-faced 28-year-old who also keeps his surname to himself, shows up in Festac Town driving a Lexus and telling how he was jobless for two years despite having a diploma in computer science.

His break came four years ago when the chief of a fraud gang saw him solve what seemed like "a complex computer problem" at a business center in the southeastern city of Umuahia and lured him to Lagos.

He won't talk about his scams, only about their fruits: "Now I have three cars, I have two houses and I'm not looking for a job anymore."

---------------
interesting article on the Nigerian scammers...I'm amazed the reporter was able to just get casual information out of them..although I suspect that those who do the most talking have actually done less action-wise....it's like going to a hacker convention and the only ones bragging are the ones who don't really do anything while the big guys keep their mouths shut...

Trev · 08-06-2005

mugu.com was a site dedicated to playing around with these scammers. It's down right now as the scammers have been emailing with fake @mugu.com headers

SykkBoy · 08-06-2005

I remember mugu.com really well

I was just surprised that the Nigerian scams really were ran out of Nigeria...I know the name should have ben a tipoff, but assumed it was "creative marketing"

MorganGrayson · 08-06-2005

Would "Nigerian Scams Really Run Out of Nigeria" be considered "truth in spam advertising?" I love oxymorons.

SykkBoy · 08-06-2005

Quote:

Originally Posted by MorganGrayson

Would "Nigerian Scams Really Run Out of Nigeria" be considered "truth in spam advertising?" I love oxymorons.

I started thinking about that...and I think I felt something in my brain go "POOF"

Trev · 08-06-2005

Quote:

Originally Posted by SykkBoy

I remember mugu.com really well

I was just surprised that the Nigerian scams really were ran out of Nigeria...I know the name should have ben a tipoff, but assumed it was "creative marketing"

If you ever go to Lagos, always chose "secure" accommodation

Plus if you're ever in Capetown don't leave the security of the "Waterfront" area or you might end up with your first plate in your head

SykkBoy · 08-06-2005

Quote:

Originally Posted by Trev

If you ever go to Lagos, always chose "secure" accommodation

Plus if you're ever in Capetown don't leave the security of the "Waterfront" area or you might end up with your first plate in your head

how did you know that I was checking priceline.com for flights to Nigeria? ;-)

Rolo · 08-06-2005

http://www.419eater.com/html/trophy_room82.htm fucking classic

Rolo · 08-06-2005

HAHAHA

Nickatilynx · 08-06-2005

The pics I'd like to see are of the people that actually fall for it....

PornoDoggy · 08-06-2005

I got one about a year ago purporting to be from the sole surviving son of a white farmer in Zimbabwe who needed my assistance in sneaking his inheritence out of the country. It had every heartstring tugging device known to man except the line "White Pride World White" in it.

Leave no demographic unspammed, I guess ...

JR · 08-07-2005

if you think its interesting that nigerian scams come from nigeria... do some searches on all the idiots that flew to nigeria to try to get their money back. quite a few people never got the chance to use the second half of their round trip ticket.

grimm · 08-07-2005

bomb em, put em in camps

domtheboy · 08-07-2005

If you really want to know if they are run out of Nigeria just PM me and I'll email Prince Gooneygoogoo from Nigeria, I have his email from a note he sent me last week asking if I'd help him launder funds through to the UK. He should be able to tell you.

Wait a minute......

08-06-2005	#1
SykkBoy Polishing the Chrome on Bishops Motorcycle $100 for every ImLive sign-up Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: Hell: Bowels : Level 9 Posts: 4,153	So the Nigerian scams really are ran out of...Nigeria? http://apnews1.iwon.com//article/200...=home&SEC=news LAGOS, Nigeria (AP) - Day in, day out, a strapping, amiable 24-year-old who calls himself Kele B. heads to an Internet cafe, hunkers down at a computer and casts his net upon the cyber-waters. Blithely oblivious to signs on the walls and desks warning of the penalties for Internet fraud, he has sent out tens of thousands of e-mails telling recipients they have won about $6.4 million in a bogus British government "Internet lottery." "Congratulation! You Are Our Lucky Winner!" it says. So far, Kele says, he has had only one response. But he claims it paid off handsomely. An American took the bait, he says, and coughed up "fees" and "taxes" of more than $5,000, never to hear from Kele again. Festac Town, a district of Lagos where the scammers ply their schemes, has become notorious for "419 scams," named for the section of the Nigerian penal code that outlaws them. In Festac Town, an entire community of scammers overnights on the Internet. By day they flaunt their smart clothes and cars and hang around the Internet cafes, trading stories about successful cons and near misses, and hatching new plots. Festac Town is where communication specialists operating underground sell foreign telephone lines over which a scammer can purport to be calling from any city in the world. Here lurk master forgers and purveyors of such software as "e-mail extractors," which can harvest e-mail addresses by the million. Now, however, a 3-year-old crackdown is yielding results, Nigerian authorities say. Nuhu Ribadu, head of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, says cash and assets worth more than $700 million were recovered from suspects between May 2003 and June 2004. More than 500 suspects have been arrested, more than 100 cases are before the courts and 500 others are under investigation, he said. The agency won its first big court victory in May when Mike Amadi was sentenced to 16 years in prison for setting up a Web site that offered juicy but phoney procurement contracts. Amadi cheekily posed as Ribadu himself and used the agency's name. He was caught by an undercover agent posing as an Italian businessman. This month the biggest international scam of all - though not one involving the Internet - ended in court convictions. Amaka Anajemba was sentenced to 2 1/2 years in prison and ordered to return $25.5 million of the $242 million she helped to steal from a Brazilian bank. The trial of four co-defendants is to start in September. Why Nigeria? There are many theories. The nation of 130 million, Africa's most populous, is well educated, and English, the lingua franca of the scam industry, is the official language. Nigeria bursts with talent, from former NBA star Hakeem Olajuwon to Nobel literature laureate Wole Soyinka. But with World Bank studies showing a quarter of urban college graduates are unemployed, crime offers tempting career opportunities - in drug dealing, immigrant-trafficking, oil-smuggling, and Internet fraud. The scammers thrived during oil-rich Nigeria's 15 years of brutal and corrupt military rule, and democracy was restored only six years ago. "We reached a point when law enforcement and regulatory agencies seemed nonexistent. But the stance of the present administration has started changing that," said Ribadu, the scam-busting chief. President Olusegun Obasanjo is winning U.S. praise for his crackdown. Interpol, the FBI and other Western law enforcement agencies have stepped in to help, says police spokesman Emmanuel Ighodalo, and Nigerian police have received equipment and Western training in combating Internet crime and money-laundering. Experts say Nigerian scams continue to flood e-mail systems, though many are being blocked by spam filters that get smarter and more aggressive. America Online Inc. Nicholas Graham says Nigerian messages lack the telltale signs of other spam - such as embedded Web links - but its filters are able to be alert to suspect mail coming from a specific range of Internet addresses. Also, the scams have a limited shelf life. In the con that Internet users are probably most familiar with, the e-mailer poses as a corrupt official looking for help in smuggling a fortune to a foreign bank account. E-mail or fax recipients are told that if they provide their banking and personal details and deposit certain sums of money, they'll get a cut of the loot. But there are other scams, like the fake lotteries. Kele B., who won't give his surname, says he couldn't find work after finishing high school in 2000 in the southeastern city of Owerri, so he drifted with friends to Lagos, where he tried his hand at boxing. Then he discovered the Web. Now he spends his mornings in Internet cafes on secondhand computers with aged screens, waiting "to see if my trap caught something," he says. Elekwa, a chubby-faced 28-year-old who also keeps his surname to himself, shows up in Festac Town driving a Lexus and telling how he was jobless for two years despite having a diploma in computer science. His break came four years ago when the chief of a fraud gang saw him solve what seemed like "a complex computer problem" at a business center in the southeastern city of Umuahia and lured him to Lagos. He won't talk about his scams, only about their fruits: "Now I have three cars, I have two houses and I'm not looking for a job anymore." --------------- interesting article on the Nigerian scammers...I'm amazed the reporter was able to just get casual information out of them..although I suspect that those who do the most talking have actually done less action-wise....it's like going to a hacker convention and the only ones bragging are the ones who don't really do anything while the big guys keep their mouths shut... __________________ ADULT PAYMASTER - All Site Access - Paying $70 October 5th! "Love your enemies...just in case your friends turn out to be bastards." - unknown

08-06-2005	#2
Trev Cunty Want to see your own Advertising Here! Join Date: Jan 2003 Posts: 10,150	Re: So the Nigerian scams really are ran out of...Nigeria? mugu.com was a site dedicated to playing around with these scammers. It's down right now as the scammers have been emailing with fake @mugu.com headers __________________ Sucks to be you.

08-06-2005	#3
SykkBoy Polishing the Chrome on Bishops Motorcycle $100 for every ImLive sign-up Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: Hell: Bowels : Level 9 Posts: 4,153	Re: So the Nigerian scams really are ran out of...Nigeria? I remember mugu.com really well I was just surprised that the Nigerian scams really were ran out of Nigeria...I know the name should have ben a tipoff, but assumed it was "creative marketing" __________________ ADULT PAYMASTER - All Site Access - Paying $70 October 5th! "Love your enemies...just in case your friends turn out to be bastards." - unknown

08-06-2005	#4
MorganGrayson None $100 for every ImLive sign-up Join Date: Apr 2004 Posts: 4,321	Re: So the Nigerian scams really are ran out of...Nigeria? Would "Nigerian Scams Really Run Out of Nigeria" be considered "truth in spam advertising?" I love oxymorons.

08-06-2005	#8
Rolo Members Join Date: Dec 2002 Location: Six Feet Under Posts: 2,150	Re: So the Nigerian scams really are ran out of...Nigeria? http://www.419eater.com/html/trophy_room82.htm fucking classic __________________ "Chaos is the law of nature, order is the dream of man." ~Henry B. Adams (Historian) 1838-1918

08-06-2005	#10
Nickatilynx Banned Want to see your own Advertising Here! Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: Vancouver Canada Posts: 15,115	Re: So the Nigerian scams really are ran out of...Nigeria? The pics I'd like to see are of the people that actually fall for it....

08-06-2005	#11
PornoDoggy Cramming 3 people in a Room to Attend Show Want to see your own Advertising Here! Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: Amid the Cornfields of Illinois Posts: 5,366	Re: So the Nigerian scams really are ran out of...Nigeria? I got one about a year ago purporting to be from the sole surviving son of a white farmer in Zimbabwe who needed my assistance in sneaking his inheritence out of the country. It had every heartstring tugging device known to man except the line "White Pride World White" in it. Leave no demographic unspammed, I guess ... __________________ SEX STORY TEXT Exotic Material for Adult Websites Available for part time (project or ongoing) work ...

08-07-2005	#12
JR Members The global leader in pay-per-view AEBN Join Date: Jan 2003 Location: in my chair Posts: 3,320	Re: So the Nigerian scams really are ran out of...Nigeria? if you think its interesting that nigerian scams come from nigeria... do some searches on all the idiots that flew to nigeria to try to get their money back. quite a few people never got the chance to use the second half of their round trip ticket. __________________

08-07-2005	#13
grimm Cramming 3 people in a Room to Attend Show Stop Lurking and start posting! Register now! Join Date: Dec 2002 Location: New Orleans, LA Posts: 5,306	Re: So the Nigerian scams really are ran out of...Nigeria? bomb em, put em in camps __________________ Think horses, not zebras.

08-07-2005	#14
domtheboy Members Join Date: Feb 2005 Posts: 612	Re: So the Nigerian scams really are ran out of...Nigeria? If you really want to know if they are run out of Nigeria just PM me and I'll email Prince Gooneygoogoo from Nigeria, I have his email from a note he sent me last week asking if I'd help him launder funds through to the UK. He should be able to tell you. Wait a minute......