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Two Letters Re: How to Thwart Nigerian Scammers: Demand Proof of Life
James,
Another variation to watch out for is when the scammer asks you to pay using an escrow account supposedly managed by Amazon or eBay.
A too good to be true add is found, you respond, the scammer/seller tells you he sells using an eBay escrow account. The merchandise will ship to you after you send a check to Escrow. The scammer directs you to a link sent in the scammers/sellers email that appears to be an eBay site.
The scammer creates the illusion of security using a brand like eBay with some official looking legal contract showing how you are in control of the escrow and the funds will only be released once you get the merchandise and are happy with the transaction.
The reality is once the money is in the escrow account, everything disappears and you never see your merchandise. eBay will tell you they don’t operate an escrow service and your options to recover your money are slim to none.
Your basic rules of thumb, poor sentence structure, punctuation, spelling and vaporware merchandise are all tell-tale signs. When in doubt, push to see the merchandise live somehow. The scammer will redirect you back to the scam or ignore you since you are not taking the bait. Keep up the good work!
Regards, – Mark in Michigan
James,
I wanted to write and give your readers another word of caution regarding Nigerian scammers; my experience involves a much more sophisticated expression of the scam than is normal.
I had placed an ad in Craigslist to sell some Morgan silver dollars; I was emailed by an out of state party who inquired as to whether I would be willing to ship them. Normally this would be odd for a Craigslist ad, but I’d dealt with this several times legitimately with regards to metals trades so it didn’t strike me as that out of the ordinary. He offered to send a check, which at the time I didn’t mind (now I always require the money to be wired). When the check arrived it was for an amount less than we had agreed on; he told me to go ahead and deposit it and he would send me another check. I deposited the check and waited.
Suspicious about a few things (the email misspellings, the erroneous check amount) I emailed him again and insisted that we speak on the phone. After a little bit of back and forth (he claimed he was deaf) he agreed to let me speak with his lawyer. Soon after an American called from a California area code and assured me everything was ok. This certainly helped set my mind at ease.
During this time my bank (USAA) had confirmed deposit of the check and credited my checking account with the funds. I looked up the depository agreement and found that USAA promised that once funds were in the account for two business days it was a confirmed transfer and the check was good.
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