How Stupid Do They Think People Are?

[Simon R]

There can't be anyone who hasn't has a spam email informing them that they're the benefactor of umpteen million quid from the death of a Nigerian prince / mysterious air crash / corrupt bank official or a lottery that you never entered.

Twenty-odd years ago they'd run along the lines of - "Give me all your banking details and a copy of your passport and I'll deposit lots of money into your account"
Perhaps the occasional gullible idiot did fall for it - after all the internet was all shiny & new and all the people using it were honest, trustworthy characters.

Nowadays thanks to publicity about identity theft, bank scams and the like everybody knows that you don't hand over bank details to the first person who asks for them - and the spam emails have become a little more subtle - instead of bank details you'll be asked to mail small (initially) sums of money - usually via Western Union - to release some fictitious document. Praise The Lard

So I was quite surprised to see this email lurking in my junk folder

From The Desk of: Mr. Scotte Cameron
Vice President
Home Equity Bank Of Canada

Attn: The Beneficiary,

TELEGRAPHIC TRANSFER NOTICE.

We are hereby officially notify you concerning your fund telegraphic Transfer through our bank, Home Equity Bank Of Canada, to your bank account, which has been officially approved by the management of World Bank Swiss (WBS) to credit the sum of US$9.six Million into your bank account.

Note that I have started processing your payment and every thing concerning the immediate remittance of your funds will be carried out within the shortest possible time from the time we received your? Below needed information.

Also be informed that the Governor of Bank in London (BL) will sign on your payment advice and a copy of the advice will be sent to the World Bank in Swiss for some record purposes.

Meanwhile your information and your full contact details were received from our research manager, Barr. Charles Dan on your behalf to FRB for immediate release of your fund, This fund was part of the lodged Late President Saddam Hussein of Iraq discovery fund with World Bank of Switzerland, which the Swiss Bank has decided to distribute it generously to help few lucky individuals and the American Government is in agreement with the Swiss Bank to distribute the fund to 600 hundred thousand people in America, Europe & Asia in other to help improve their businesses due to Covid 19.

Therefore, reconfirm the aforesaid information accurately, because this office cannot afford to be held liable for any wrong transfer of funds or liable of any fund credited into an unknown account.

These are the information we needed to be reconfirmed by you.

1) YOUR FULL NAME:
2) ADDRESS,CITY,STATE AND COUNTRY.
3) PHONE,FAX AND MOBILE
4) COMPANY NAME(IF ANY) POSITION AND ADDRESS
5) BANK DETAILS,
BANK NAMES,
ACCOUNT NO,
ROUTING NO,
SWIFT CODE
BANK ADDRESS.
6) PROFESSION,AGE AND MARITAL STATUS
7) COPY OF YOUR INT'L PASSPORT/DRIVERS LICENSE

Finally, you are required to reconfirm directly to me the above information to enable me use it to process your bill of payment.


Yours Faithfully,
Mr. Scotte Cameron
Vice President Director, Credit /Telex

Not only does it mention five different countries the return email has a thai country code

It should be preserved really - how scam emails used to look

Simon

 

[tipitinmick]

You mean to say I may not be the long lost brother of the king of Nigeria Simon ? I’ve sent him 5k to cover his flight over here. I’ve not seen him as yet he must be delayed. What ya think ? ??

 

[ukzero1]

You mean to say I may not be the long lost brother of the king of Nigeria Simon ? I’ve sent him 5k to cover his flight over here. I’ve not seen him as yet he must be delayed. What ya think ? ??

I did the same. He says he's on lock-down (or is that locked up?).

 

[muskrat]

The grammar and spelling is so perfect. How could you possibly doubt its authenticity?

 

[spanky]

What could possibly go wrong?

 

[J W]

I think you have a duty to reply...?

 

[Neil ofthe nene]

The thing is they work. Still people get fleeced of thousands and make the scammers millions a year. If that was not so they would not be doing it.

What upsets me more than anything is that amateur scam busters can reverse look up the scammers and even hack into their CCTV, find real names, locations, intercept messages and find Facebook accounts (check out YouTube) even take control of their computers. Yet our authorities, who are paid millions to protect us, take no such action. If they did you could shut the scammers down in days.

Instead just look up a scam caller's number at a website like Who Called Me to see that scam telephone numbers are not blocked for months or years. If a member of the public like me can find a pattern of scam calls from a number why can't the authorities?

We should be threatening to cut all telephone ties with India, Nigeria and other host countries until their authorities get serious. But that won't happen partly because the authorities in those countries are getting a rake off of the scammers takings and the ones in this country have no stomach for the fight. The other problem is that while each individual crime is taken in isolation by the police the amounts are too small and the numbers too large for them to take action because they know they cannot solve it hence it would impact their figures negatively.

I would honestly vote Labour if they promised to take real action against scam callers, emailers and texters.

 

[tipitinmick]

I did the same. He says he's on lock-down (or is that locked up?).

Oh, that’s a weight off my mind. I thought I’d lost my 5k. ? We shouldn’t laugh really some folk have done just that and lost a lot of money. ?

 

[ukzero1]

Oh, that’s a weight off my mind. I thought I’d lost my 5k. ? We shouldn’t laugh really some folk have done just that and lost a lot of money. ?

Apparently he says, your name in Swahili is Limpopo Katanga, which translates to 'Lover of all Northern Moles'.

I can understand why people fall for them as they are getting to look more genuine, but after all this time I thought they would have learned by now.

 

[tipitinmick]

Apparently he says, your name in Swahili is Limpopo Katanga, which translates to 'Lover of all Northern Moles'.

I can understand why people fall for them as they are getting to look more genuine, but after all this time I thought they would have learned by now.

Genuine ? Yes, Morris is the real deal. ??

No, you’re right Peter. The emails are very convincing. It’s time something was done about these scammers.

 

[John Step]

Having in the last year gone through my parents mental decline and demise I can see who are the ones being caught.
Sadly in hindsight the signs were there but creeping a little at a time. The dottiness got worse and reality became less.
There would have been a stage of decline when they were definitely likely to have been caught.

 

[Peezartiste]

I keep getting text messages as follows:

"From Lloyds Bank:
Confirmation: You set up a new recipient on (todays date and time) from account ending 0046.
If this was not you please call:
03450725555 or +471733347388 from abroad."

Now I don't have and never had an account with Lloyds so know it is some kind of scam, but how about some more guillable person who does have an account with them. They may not even take note of the account ending number, panic and phone one of the numbers.
I have never tried phoning any of these numbers, but feel free to try yourself. The website "Who called me" lists it as dangerous.

 

[davej]

Had five calls in last couple of days informing me my internet is being cut off because of "illegal activity",on the internet. they are phoning on behalf of my internet supplier but they never say who that is, always the same voice but different phone numbers. She gets the usual two word reply.

 

[GeoffW]

A novel based on the "419" scam system - eye opening