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Story Of A 419 Victim
from the greedy-greedy-greedy dept
I still can't believe people fall for Nigerian 419 scams any more. The scam has been around for ages, and I get about five such scam emails every day. You have to have been living in a hole not to know about them, but apparently there are still plenty of people (with lots of excess cash to throw away) who fall for it every day. While authorities estimate that the vast majority of 419 scam victims never admit what happened (mostly out of embarrassment for their own greed), it appears the press has found someone in Singapore who's willing to admit just how greedy he was. He fell for a typical 419 scam, and lost about $200,000 (US) - some of which he'd borrowed. He's now trying to sell his house. He seems to realize how stupid the whole thing was - or, at least - his wife is making sure he realizes: "My wife said I use the handphone so much that my brain is damaged. I think she's right. She said my eyes can see only the dollar signs."
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Good entertainment
I get a huge amount of these emails, too. Several a day. Recently I began really READING them, and they are hilarious in that it turns out many are nearly identical except for a word or two, and the most recent one I got had the person change their name by the end of the email! Also, I've gotten many which almost tell a story... I get one email from the son of a deposed leader, another from his lawyer, another from his younger brother, etc, each telling a bit of the story. One from a son who's father was killed by a rebel leader, and one from the rebel leader's son who's father was killed by the government! I'm going to make a website trying to paint a picture of the African political situation based entirely on scam emails. It should be very informative. :) Also, I've learned that huge numbers of banks in Africa have accounts of deceased Westerners with tens of millions of dollars in them. Africa must be a very wealthy continent.
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New scam idea: create sob story for "retired couple" who lost their "life savings" in an "internet scam".
Set up paypal address, request funds from well wishers.
better yet: create an email indicating Bill Gates will match all donations sent provided recipient also forwards the email to 10 people.
Perfect. Next...
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