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08/11/2003 01:19:39 AM · #1
Ok, I thought this scam was done a long time ago and everyone new about it, but I guess not. I received this letter in my email a couple weeks ago-

Subject: VERY URGENT ATTENTION Jeremy West
To: jeremy@landbountiful.com


FROM FORTUNE/CAROLINE COLMAN

ABIDJAN COTE D'IVOIRE.

May this mail find you well.

I got your contact address on my desperate search for
a reliable person/company for partnership investments
believing you will not let us down or betray the trust
we are to impose on you.

By introduction, I am FORTUNE COLMAN from Sierra
Leonean the son of late DR.PHILLIP COLMAN,Before the
death of my father he disclosed to me about the total
sum of $10 million US dollars he deposited under a
suspense account with a bank in Abidjan Capital City
Of Cote d'Ivoire.

This fund represent the huge Sales of Gold and Diamond
he diverted while in office as the director general
for Gold and Diamond Mining Co-Opretionin in Sierra
Leone .For security reason according to my late
father, he made an agreement with the bank that his
partner/beneficiary will come forward to submit his
banking details for onward transfer of the fund to his
account.

DR.PHILLIP COLMAN , my late father advice me in case
if he died that I should look for a foreigner who will
stand as the beneficiary of the fund so that the fund
will be transfer to his/her account for partnership
investment. Right now, I am in Abidjan Ivoire with my
only sister called CAROLINE COLMAN, the purpose of
transferring this fund to a trustworthy account.
Meanwhile, I am writing to know if you can stand as
the beneficiary of the fund and to also provide me
your banking details so that I will submit it to the
bank for transfer of the fund for partnership
investment you will introduce in your country.

Note that after the transfer is made to your account,
you will then with draw some money and send to us in
order for me and my only sister CAROLINE secure the
necessary documents to enable us come over to meet you
for the investment. On confirmation of your interest
to assist us,the certificate of deposit with the
agreementry letter of the fund which was issued to my
late father by the bank on the day he deposited the
fund will be forward to you for your confirmation. 10%
of the total sum will be offered to you for your
assistance, while 2% will be set aside for any
expenses that might arise during the transfer.

Indicate your interest as soon as you received this
mail, and note that this transaction need to be
confidential.

We wait to hearing from you.

Regards.

FORTUNE COLMAN AND SISTER CAROLINE COLMAN


--
Ok, I thought this was hilarious and couldn't beleive that people still fall for this. If they really had 10 mil dollars why would they transfer it into someone's account they didn't even know. Anyway, I just wanted to post a warning and reminder to be careful of potential scams out there. I've kind of egged the people who sent me this scam email though, because I've responded to them. I've made up a fake business that me and my "partner" (Jason Voorhees) is running called 'Crystal Lake Adventures', and have been emailing them back and forth for two weeks now. They've sent me scanned images of their passport and bank statements to prove that they are real and that I can trust them. It looked like they don't know how to use photoshop, they were that bad. Well they've just asked me to Western Union their bank $3600 for a hidden transfer fee and then I'll get the 10 mil transfered to my account.
08/11/2003 01:27:56 AM · #2
Yeah, I get a couple of those a week. I read a hilarious story once somewhere online about someone who kept up with these guys...I'll have to see if I can find it.
08/11/2003 01:44:37 AM · #3
You might consider forwarding your correspondence to the US Postal Inspectors and the FBI.
08/11/2003 04:46:48 AM · #4
hey, We have some Icelandars here who fell for this shit...

It was pretty bad for them in the end, these dudes are some criminals who kill...

- or something...

hey! - I got some e-mail like this the other day:

FROM:MIREK PENNY.
PHONE:(874)-762864167
FAX :(874)-762864168

RE: TRANSFER OF ($26,000.000.00 USD} TWENTY SIX
MILLION DOLLARS

Dear Sir,

We want to transfer ($26,000.000.00 USD) Twenty six
million United States Dollars from a Prime Bank here
in South Africa to oversea account. First, I must
solicit your strictest confidence in this
transaction.This is by virtue of it's nature as being
utterly confidential. I am sure and have confidence of
your ability and reliability to prosecute a
transaction of this great magnitude.

I solicit your assistance to enable us transfer the
said amount into your safe account for unward
investment.You can either provide us with an existing
account or to set up a new Bank account immediately to
receive this money, even an empty a/c can serve to
receive this money, as long as you will remain honest
to me till the end for this important business
trusting in you and believing in that you will never
let me down either now or in future.

I am the Auditor general and the personal account
officer to a great late INDUSTRIALIST who has an
account in one of the prime banks here in South
Africa. The account was opened in 1996 and he died in
1998 without a written or oral WILL and since 1998
nobody has operated on this account again hence the
money is floating and if I do not remit this money out
urgently it will be forfeited for nothing since the
bank has been sold on Wed, 19 Mar 2003 to another
bank and the management of the bank now is ready to
release the fund to any foreigner who has the correct information of the account before fully handing over the management to the new bank. [ Search; //business.iafrica.com/news/220677.htm]

The owner of this account is a foreigner and no other
person knows about this account or anything concerning
it, the account has no other beneficiary and until
his death he was the manager of the company . My investigation through the National immigration department proved to me as well that he was single as at his point of his entry into Republic of South Africa.

We will start the first transfer with Six million
[$6,000.000] upon successful transfer without any disappointment from your side, we shall re-apply for the payment of the remaining balance of 20 million to your account.

The total amount involve is Twenty six million United
States Dollars only [$26,000.000.00]. I want to first
transfer $6,000.000.00 [Six million United States
Dollar] from this money into a safe foreigners account
abroad before the rest.But I don't know any foreigner,
I am only contacting you as a foreigner because this
money can not be approved to a local person here, but
can only be approved to any foreigner who has the
correct information of the account which I will
provide to you.

On confirmation of your willingness to receive this
fund in your account, I will involve my confidant
attorney who is the government accredited attorney to
the bank to represent you in various offices here to
secure all the relevant documents in your name
required to make the transfer a success. I therefore
assure you that this transaction is 100% risk and
trouble free to both parties.

However, we will sign a binding agreement, to bind us
together when we meet face to face after the first
transfer of $6 Million before transferring the second
part of $20 Million. I am revealing this to you with
believe that you will never let me down in this
business, you are the first and the only person that I
am contacting for this business, so please reply
urgently so that I will inform you the next step to
take urgently.

Send me full details of the account to be used for
this transfer, including your direct telephone and
fax numbers so that we can have a heart to heart
discussion.I want us to meet face to face to
build confidence and to sign a binding agreement that
will bind us together immediately after the first
transfer before we fly to your country for withdrawal,
sharing and investments.

I need your full co-operation to make this work fine
because the management is ready to approve this
payment to any foreigner who has correct information
of this account, which I will give to you upon your
positive response and once I am convinced that you are
capable and will meet up with instruction of a key
bank official who is deeply involved with me in this
business. I need your strong assurance that you will
never, never let me down.

With my position and influence in the bank, the
money can be transferred to any foreigner's reliable
account that you can provide with assurance that this
money will be intact pending our physical arrival in
your country for sharing. The bank official Will
destroy all documents of transaction immediately we
receive this money leaving no trace to any place and
to build confidence.

You can call me for heart to heart discussion through
my private satellite phone which I secured for the
security and safety of this business as you know that
this business is confidential

At the conclusion of this business, you will be given
35% of the total amount, 60% will be for me, while 5%
will be for expenses both parties might have incurred
during the process of transferring.

I look forward to your earliest reply through my email
address/ fax or telephone.

Regards,
MIREK PENNY.

---
this is stupid...

v.

08/11/2003 05:15:13 AM · #5
It's bad enough getting 10 of these laughable time-wasters each week without having the FULL transcript repeated in a digital photograph competition forum!!!! =(

Anybody fool enough to fall for them deserves to be separated from their fortune, since all they are after is a quick buck through corrupt means.

Message edited by author 2003-08-11 07:49:56.
08/11/2003 10:04:15 AM · #6
I'm lucky enough to receive a few of these a day! I stick 'em in a file for my own amusement... I have several hundred of them filed away. Sometimes I feel compelled to respond with some not-so-nice language against these morons.
08/11/2003 10:54:47 AM · #7
A company called silicon.com did respond - and went the whole way with them up to the point of sending faxes of bank details. The journalist posed as an idiot who thought it was a great idea, and proceeded to infuriate the sender with volumous correspondence and stupidity! Very funny - read the transcript of correspondence here:
//www.silicon.com/news/500019/1/2928.html

Message edited by author 2003-08-11 11:34:35.
08/11/2003 11:18:57 AM · #8
Here's a great news bit (don't worry, it's a joke):

3rd Annual Nigerian EMail Conference

Enjoy.
08/11/2003 01:22:00 PM · #9
The FBIs advise: //www.fbi.gov/majcases/fraud/fraudschemes.htm#nigerian
08/11/2003 03:23:53 PM · #10
Originally posted by Jon Lucas:

A company called silicon.com did respond - and went the whole way with them up to the point of sending faxes of bank details. The journalist posed as an idiot who thought it was a great idea, and proceeded to infuriate the sender with volumous correspondence and stupidity! Very funny - read the transcript of correspondence here:
//www.silicon.com/news/500019/1/2928.html


Thanks for the link Jon, I thought it was hilarious. I have done almost the exact same thing and they are getting a little annoyed with me and want me to get back from my "business trip" so I can complete the transaction. I have a whole story that I've written, I guess I'm just bored or something. But in it, me and my partner "Jason Voorhees" are on a trip in Southern Utah because Jason found a map to some hidden Aztec Gold. We are about to find a once in a lifetime find worth hundreds of millions of dollars. I'm about to have an expense come up and ask the nigerians for money and to invest and I'll give them 15% of our findings. I'm going to see what they say about that. I also need to tell them not to tell anybody because we don't want looters at our site. I need to email them tonight from our "Satelite Connection" at camp. It is funny because they completely believe about my trip and they can't wait till I get home.

EDIT- I think that I should have kept copies of all of my replies and theirs, because it is hilarious.

Message edited by author 2003-08-11 15:24:35.
08/11/2003 04:47:57 PM · #11
I work for an anti-spam company, and these are taken pretty seriously. People DO fall for them. They will normally get extorted for money (for a variety of plausible reasons) to release the huge sums of money, and if they actually get to Nigeria (or wherever else) are normally held to randsom with relatives, beaten, or worse.
08/12/2003 01:42:36 AM · #12
Hey Paul, Thanks for the input. I have read up a lot on the scam since I've received the email from them and on the Secret Service's website it says that people do still fall for these scams. I wrote our local newspaper to see if they've ever run an article on the scams. I just want to make more people aware of these things. It gets pretty nasty if you actually travel to the country, some people have even been killed over these scams.
08/12/2003 08:49:33 AM · #13
More funny correspondence of people who responded to this here and here :)
08/12/2003 11:17:17 AM · #14
Of course, we probably can expect some new variations now the Charles Taylor's in exile there.
02/20/2004 04:52:41 AM · #15
Oh my, ROFL, I just got this one:

Good Day My Dearest Friend,
How are you and your family today? I hope that you are all okay? I found information about you and decided to contact you for an important assistance. I am Prince m nkomo. A citizen of Zimbabwe, but I am contacting from a nearby country here in IVORY CAOST where I am now
seeking political asylum.
I am the only son of Kenneth Nkomo, a wealthy farmer and senior politician with the opposition political party in my country, Movement for Democratic Change [MDC]. My father was murdered by our wicked President, Robert Mugabe and I fled my country because I have become his next target to eliminate.
My father was a fighter for Justice and a moving force in the MDC, a part wanting to end the several years of brutal dictatorship government of President Robert Mug be. My father was accused of Treason and also assisting the White farmers in fighting the government. Few weeks after his arrest, he was reported dead.
The government claimed he died of heart attack and his body was never seen for proper autopsy, they buried him in the government cemetery. My father's associate Mr. Martin Olds a White farmer from Britain assisted me in fighting my father's death through the Court and media; the government saw us as a big treat to them and decided to eliminate us. Mr. Olds was attacked and murdered in his house, but fortunately, before they came looking for me, I received the news and I had to flee through the border to South Africa to save my life. My arrival here in IVORY COAST still remains like a miracle to me.
Here, is my reasons for contacting you, I am having a huge sum of money in the total sum of $13.6Million presently lodge with the security company in Holland, My father kept this money in two trunk boxes in disguise as family treasures and could not bank them, because of the situation in my country. The government seized my father's business, farms and banks account before his arrest and murder.
He told me everything concerning the funds while he was still in detention and I have made several arrangements concerning the shipment of the boxes out of my country because we cannot invest it there. I was on the process when I fled the country. I need your assistance in
securing the funds there in your country, so that I can arrange on how to come over to your country to invest with the fund I am willing to offer you 30% of the $13.6Million for your assistance.
Please, let me know if you can assist me, so that I can give you more details on how we shall proceed. As I wait for your urgent response, please treat this information as top secret.

Best Regards,
Prince j nkomo.
02/20/2004 04:56:24 AM · #16
Originally posted by Kavey:

Oh my, ROFL, I just got this one:

Good Day My Dearest Friend,
How are you and your family today? I hope that you are all okay?

I am Prince m nkomo.


Best Regards,
Prince j nkomo.


It's funny how he calls himself Prince M Nkomo at the top, then Prince J Nkomo at the bottom...

Have you sent them your bank details yet??? I'll be sending him mine!! ;-)

Message edited by author 2004-02-20 04:56:38.
02/20/2004 05:18:52 AM · #17
Hmmm... let me see... well I was sorely tempted, his letter seems so genuine (!!!) but I decided to restrain myself. Too much good fortune might go to my head!

:o)
02/20/2004 05:40:15 AM · #18
You've got to wonder how many people actually fall for it... If no one did, they wouldn't keep sending out the e-mails.
02/20/2004 05:47:24 AM · #19
Originally posted by brownt:

You've got to wonder how many people actually fall for it... If no one did, they wouldn't keep sending out the e-mails.

People DO fall for it. This scam has been going on, in letter form, for years and years. Such unfortunates usually end up being extorted for money, and if they actual end up going to the country (not necessarily Nigeria), beaten and held for randsom to family members.
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