A new twist on the Nigerian scam

janusz · 3rd July 2012, 07:06 PM

According to this story in the Economist, based on a paper published by Microsoft, it is argued that though Nigeria is well known as the source of 419 scams, many crooks make puzzlingly little attempt to hide their origins. Apparently blatancy is a means of weeding out all but the most credulous respondents.

Tsunami · 5th July 2012, 07:24 AM

While the scam mails should be easy to identify by any rationally thinking person, business offers from Nigeria that are genuine are also not low in numbers. It's one of the more rapidly growing economies in Africa, although it is a question mark how the lack of safety and growing unrest in the nation will have an impact or not. But I've seen on domaining websites a growing interest in .com.ng domains because of the economical growth and business with Nigeria.

Obviously though the scam mails should still be easy to separate from the genuine ones. It is a bit like the African variant of Russia: some people assume .ru means spam, while there's so many genuine mails from Russia ...

Burkina Faso by the way is also interesting when it comes to creativity in spam/scam emails. They tend to be funnier too because of the linguistic errors and the surrealness of the proposals.

webecedarian · 9th July 2012, 05:25 AM

Interestingly, these scams pre-date email. I used to daydream of some way to try to scam these guys back.

For anyone who likes to read, this is a wonderful piece that The New Yorker ran several years ago about a reasonably intelligent guy who should have known better, who was caught up in one of these scams.

The Perfect Mark
http://www.newyorker.com/archive/200.../060515fa_fact

n5bb · 9th July 2012, 12:45 PM

Thanks for the New Yorker article link. That's a great story about how greed works. Even though they often can't reliably spell their invented names, the scammers are very intelligent manipulators of human nature.

SusanUKF · 17th July 2012, 02:21 AM

The latest telephone scam that I am getting really sick and tired of is from people falsely claiming to be from Microsoft -- I choose different options depending on my mood when they call: I either tell them we have no computers (we have 6 online), or I tell them we only use Ubantu or Apple products. They hang up usually without even making another comment.

The phone calls are annoying but I feel less aggravated with my method.

If people believe them they get people to let them have remote access to their computers, and are then able to hack into them of course; I am sure many people unaware of these schemes have been unfortunately duped...

Susan

FredOnline · 17th July 2012, 03:03 PM

Why humor them - if they start with their spiel and I realize it's any type of cold call, I just put the 'phone down - no words from me at all!

robert@fm · 17th July 2012, 07:59 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by FredOnline

Why humor them - if they start with their spiel and I realize it's any type of cold call, I just put the 'phone down - no words from me at all!

I've heard that sometimes, if you do this, they just ring straight back.

A better technique, so I'm told, is to listen (or pretend to listen) and then say "You clearly need to speak to my daddy/husband/wife/whoever; I'll go get him/her" then put the receiver on the table (don't hang up) and go about your business for 10-15 minutes before quietly hanging up. That leaves them doubly frustrated because you're wasting 10-15 minutes of their time, in which they could have made dozens of their spam calls and racked up the commission...

SusanUKF · 20th July 2012, 02:57 AM

I distinctly remember us having a thread about solicitor phone calls on here a few years ago. I did a search and wasn't able to locate it but back then people had some interesting ideas.

I know some people reverse the chat and try to sell them stuff, or ask them personal questions, say give your number at home and I will call you back when it is more convenient for me to talk, etc. I do think that when you hang up they call back soon afterwards, this has been my experience too. My responses often depend on my mood at the time of the calls.... sometimes I just say I am not interested thanks and hang up before they can reply, and sometimes I decide to be a smart alec.

Susan

FredOnline · 20th July 2012, 03:39 AM

The bottom line is, I paid to have the telephone line installed, I paid for the line rental - for my convenience, not to make it easy for someone to try to sell me something.

A second of my time to find out if it's a cold call - then the 'phone goes down - I will not waste another second with small talk.

JWebster · 28th September 2012, 06:18 AM

For several months now, I have been recieving these bogus credit card or payday loan offers from domain names that don't exist, such as capstacked.com, sammyschnees.com, sammysailor.com, comehompop.com, comehomepopper.com, trustinersk.com, stackofcarpet.com, I can't remember them all there are several more. Is anyone else familiar with this problem?

n5bb · 28th September 2012, 10:13 AM

That sounds like common spam to me. Sorry that this post is so long, but there are very important things you might not realize about such odd messages in your Inbox.

The bad guys want you to click on their link. The From address, the subject, and the body of the message really aren't important except as a way to entice you to click a link to purchase something interesting or just because you are curious. You may then be redirected to a completely different URL where they can try to get you to buy something (or at least enter something of value, such as your email address, credit card number, address, phone number, etc.) or they try to download malware (viruses) to your computer.

It's important that your email provider (or email client) filter out (or warn you) about these messages, since many of them may look like your bank or other normal commercial messages. The From address is rarely owned by the spammer -- it's either a made-up address, a random address at some good domain, your own address, or a stolen address from the address book or saved emails with long CC lists of a computer infected with a virus. So if you receive an email which appears to be From a friend or family member or a company you do business with, but something looks unusual (such as a message body which is very short such as CLICK HERE and an unfamiliar URL), DON'T click on the link! Look at the Full Headers of that message and you will probably see that it same from some country you don't normally do business with.

Some of the domains you listed were registered on Jan 14, 2012, and June 25, 2012:
http://www.dailychanges.com/registra...om/2012-01-14/ (comehome....)
http://www.newly-registered-domains....06-25-249.html (sammy)

Spammers register several cheap domains, then send out huge quantities of spam very quickly before email providers start blocking those domains (which often takes a few days). So if you wonder about some domain you see in a possible spam message, DON'T click on the link or load that domain in your browser. Instead, just perform a web search (Google, Bing, etc.) for that domain. You will probably see the domain in the newly registered lists, which is how I found those links I gave above.

Again, it's important to remember that criminals are trying to get you to click on a URL link or in some other way download something from their server so they can install malware (viruses) on your PC or get you to enter something on a form which has a small value to them. They may not use the information directly, but may sell your email address to others as an address where someone might click on links in spam message. The value of your address or whatever they learn about you may be very small (a few cents), but if they can get several hundred suckers to click on such links each day they can harvest a few dollars a day from victims, who then get infected by software attempting to steal their online banking or other valuable information.

Be sure to have security software installed on your PC (updated regularly) which scans for malware (viruses). And be sure to install all of the released security patches for your operating system, browsers, helper programs such as Java or Flash, etc. This is why it can be dangerous to use old unpatched browsers or operating systems -- one click on a bad link and you may instantly be infected with a virus which is very difficult to detect and remove.

Bill

webecedarian · 26th October 2012, 11:42 AM

Funny, I was thinking how the internet must have been a gift from God for these guys. I used to see Nigerian letters when they were literally letters, sent by overseas postal mail. It must have have cost them quite a lot just to mail them. They used to be typed on old-fashioned non-electric pre-IBM typewriters, or even hand-written, on ordinary paper, but I also remember one arriving on elegant formal stationery with a gold embossed governmental-looking seal, from someone claiming to be a prince or a cabinet minister.

3rd July 2012, 07:06 PM	#1
janusz The "e" in e-mail Join Date: Feb 2006 Location: EU Posts: 3,022	A new twist on the Nigerian scam According to this story in the Economist, based on a paper published by Microsoft, it is argued that though Nigeria is well known as the source of 419 scams, many crooks make puzzlingly little attempt to hide their origins. Apparently blatancy is a means of weeding out all but the most credulous respondents.

17th July 2012, 02:21 AM	#5
SusanUKF Intergalactic Postmaster Join Date: Oct 2003 Location: Canada Posts: 5,428	The latest telephone scam that I am getting really sick and tired of is from people falsely claiming to be from Microsoft -- I choose different options depending on my mood when they call: I either tell them we have no computers (we have 6 online), or I tell them we only use Ubantu or Apple products. They hang up usually without even making another comment. The phone calls are annoying but I feel less aggravated with my method. If people believe them they get people to let them have remote access to their computers, and are then able to hack into them of course; I am sure many people unaware of these schemes have been unfortunately duped... Susan Last edited by SusanUKF : 17th July 2012 at 02:27 AM.

28th September 2012, 06:18 AM	#10
JWebster Junior Member Join Date: Sep 2012 Posts: 2	Has anyone recieved bogus credit card or payday loan offers? For several months now, I have been recieving these bogus credit card or payday loan offers from domain names that don't exist, such as capstacked.com, sammyschnees.com, sammysailor.com, comehompop.com, comehomepopper.com, trustinersk.com, stackofcarpet.com, I can't remember them all there are several more. Is anyone else familiar with this problem?

28th September 2012, 10:13 AM	#11
n5bb Intergalactic Postmaster Join Date: May 2004 Location: Irving, Texas Posts: 5,977	Sounds like spam That sounds like common spam to me. Sorry that this post is so long, but there are very important things you might not realize about such odd messages in your Inbox. The bad guys want you to click on their link. The From address, the subject, and the body of the message really aren't important except as a way to entice you to click a link to purchase something interesting or just because you are curious. You may then be redirected to a completely different URL where they can try to get you to buy something (or at least enter something of value, such as your email address, credit card number, address, phone number, etc.) or they try to download malware (viruses) to your computer. It's important that your email provider (or email client) filter out (or warn you) about these messages, since many of them may look like your bank or other normal commercial messages. The From address is rarely owned by the spammer -- it's either a made-up address, a random address at some good domain, your own address, or a stolen address from the address book or saved emails with long CC lists of a computer infected with a virus. So if you receive an email which appears to be From a friend or family member or a company you do business with, but something looks unusual (such as a message body which is very short such as CLICK HERE and an unfamiliar URL), DON'T click on the link! Look at the Full Headers of that message and you will probably see that it same from some country you don't normally do business with. Some of the domains you listed were registered on Jan 14, 2012, and June 25, 2012: http://www.dailychanges.com/registra...om/2012-01-14/ (comehome....) http://www.newly-registered-domains....06-25-249.html (sammy) Spammers register several cheap domains, then send out huge quantities of spam very quickly before email providers start blocking those domains (which often takes a few days). So if you wonder about some domain you see in a possible spam message, DON'T click on the link or load that domain in your browser. Instead, just perform a web search (Google, Bing, etc.) for that domain. You will probably see the domain in the newly registered lists, which is how I found those links I gave above. Again, it's important to remember that criminals are trying to get you to click on a URL link or in some other way download something from their server so they can install malware (viruses) on your PC or get you to enter something on a form which has a small value to them. They may not use the information directly, but may sell your email address to others as an address where someone might click on links in spam message. The value of your address or whatever they learn about you may be very small (a few cents), but if they can get several hundred suckers to click on such links each day they can harvest a few dollars a day from victims, who then get infected by software attempting to steal their online banking or other valuable information. Be sure to have security software installed on your PC (updated regularly) which scans for malware (viruses). And be sure to install all of the released security patches for your operating system, browsers, helper programs such as Java or Flash, etc. This is why it can be dangerous to use old unpatched browsers or operating systems -- one click on a bad link and you may instantly be infected with a virus which is very difficult to detect and remove. Bill

5th July 2012, 07:24 AM	#2
Tsunami Master of the @ Join Date: Jun 2004 Location: in between the bright lights and the far unlit unknown Posts: 1,557	While the scam mails should be easy to identify by any rationally thinking person, business offers from Nigeria that are genuine are also not low in numbers. It's one of the more rapidly growing economies in Africa, although it is a question mark how the lack of safety and growing unrest in the nation will have an impact or not. But I've seen on domaining websites a growing interest in .com.ng domains because of the economical growth and business with Nigeria. Obviously though the scam mails should still be easy to separate from the genuine ones. It is a bit like the African variant of Russia: some people assume .ru means spam, while there's so many genuine mails from Russia ... Burkina Faso by the way is also interesting when it comes to creativity in spam/scam emails. They tend to be funnier too because of the linguistic errors and the surrealness of the proposals.

9th July 2012, 05:25 AM	#3
webecedarian Senior Member Join Date: Apr 2005 Location: NYC Posts: 170	Interestingly, these scams pre-date email. I used to daydream of some way to try to scam these guys back. For anyone who likes to read, this is a wonderful piece that The New Yorker ran several years ago about a reasonably intelligent guy who should have known better, who was caught up in one of these scams. The Perfect Mark http://www.newyorker.com/archive/200.../060515fa_fact

9th July 2012, 12:45 PM	#4
n5bb Intergalactic Postmaster Join Date: May 2004 Location: Irving, Texas Posts: 5,977	Thanks for the New Yorker article link. That's a great story about how greed works. Even though they often can't reliably spell their invented names, the scammers are very intelligent manipulators of human nature.

17th July 2012, 03:03 PM	#6
FredOnline Cornerstone of the Community Join Date: Apr 2011 Location: Manchester UK Posts: 699	Why humor them - if they start with their spiel and I realize it's any type of cold call, I just put the 'phone down - no words from me at all!

20th July 2012, 02:57 AM	#8
SusanUKF Intergalactic Postmaster Join Date: Oct 2003 Location: Canada Posts: 5,428	I distinctly remember us having a thread about solicitor phone calls on here a few years ago. I did a search and wasn't able to locate it but back then people had some interesting ideas. I know some people reverse the chat and try to sell them stuff, or ask them personal questions, say give your number at home and I will call you back when it is more convenient for me to talk, etc. I do think that when you hang up they call back soon afterwards, this has been my experience too. My responses often depend on my mood at the time of the calls.... sometimes I just say I am not interested thanks and hang up before they can reply, and sometimes I decide to be a smart alec. Susan

20th July 2012, 03:39 AM	#9
FredOnline Cornerstone of the Community Join Date: Apr 2011 Location: Manchester UK Posts: 699	The bottom line is, I paid to have the telephone line installed, I paid for the line rental - for my convenience, not to make it easy for someone to try to sell me something. A second of my time to find out if it's a cold call - then the 'phone goes down - I will not waste another second with small talk.

26th October 2012, 11:42 AM	#12
webecedarian Senior Member Join Date: Apr 2005 Location: NYC Posts: 170	Funny, I was thinking how the internet must have been a gift from God for these guys. I used to see Nigerian letters when they were literally letters, sent by overseas postal mail. It must have have cost them quite a lot just to mail them. They used to be typed on old-fashioned non-electric pre-IBM typewriters, or even hand-written, on ordinary paper, but I also remember one arriving on elegant formal stationery with a gold embossed governmental-looking seal, from someone claiming to be a prince or a cabinet minister.