Timesuck with Dan Cummins - 23 - The Nigerian Email Scam

Episode Date: February 20, 2017

Ever wondered who's sending you those crazy emails from someone claiming to want share a large sum of money with you or be tracking you down for a huge inheritance? Why are they almost always supposedly from Nigeria? Why are they so poorly written? Find out who these scammers are, why the scam became popular in Nigeria, how much money they're making, who they're making it from, why they word them the way they do, and when the scam originated in this eye-opening edition of Timesuck.

I got an email the other day from the United Nations Compensation Payment Unit New York. The subject line read, 3.5 million UN Compensation Payments slash, are you dead or alive? Three question marks. And here's the well-written personal, and 100% legit sounding email they sent me accompanied by somebody more talented than myself, tickling the ivories for a little dramatic effect. Attention beneficiary. Scam victims compensation payment. Please be informed that your long awaited compensation funds payment in the tune of 3.5

million has finally been approved but it has also been brought to our notice that a gentle man, two words. By the name Michael, Eitan has just forwarded a new banking details claiming he is your next of kin and you are dead so here comes the big question, colon. Did you authorize the above mentioned name to claim your funds? Are you truly dead or alive? I like how that's how that's an option. You can reply back, I'm dead. Is Michael Layton, Iten? Oh, it was late and before now, it's not, it was Iten before now it's

late. Is Michael Layton, your next of kin? If no kindly reconfirmed this information and get back to us with the below information for verification, as the wire will be done within 48 hours from this notice. Your name, current home address, country, occupation, telephone number, age, gender. Got to verify the gender. We await your urgent response so that we can proceed with your 3.5 million payment. Yours faithfully, this is the best part. Reverend Dr. Johnson Williams. Who's sending this email? The only thing I know for sure is that it isn't someone named the Reverend Dr. Johnson Williams. Who leads with Reverend Dr.? That sounds as idiotic as Dr. lawyer or professor teacher. Hi, I'm professor fireman, Dr. John Jim.

Pick one title. stick with that one. And pick one first name, one last name. Why does this Reverend Doctor have two last names and no first names? I've gotten several emails like this a week, every week for what feels like at least a decade. Why are these emails always so poorly written? Why does none of them ever sound even remotely legit?

Does this ever work? Who started this scam? All of this and so, so much more on today's $3.5 million, UN edition of Reverend Dr. Time Suck. You're listening to Time Suck. You're listening to Time Suck. You're listening to Time Suck. You're listening to Time Suck.

You're listening to Time Suck. Thanks for tuning in again, time suckers. You all suck in the best possible sucking way. Big thanks to At This O'Keefe on Twitter for hitting me up and suggesting the 419 scam and sending me off in the direction of today's time suck, 419 FYI refers to the section of the Nigerian criminal code that detail the deals with the investigation and punishment of this particular type of fraud. Let's get into it.

So here's how the scam works. The 419 scam, also known as the advanced fee scam, is pretty simple and technique. A scammer reaches out to you with an offer of a large sum of money in exchange for some type of assistance. You know, they're having trouble getting the money released from customs. They need your help. Their assets have been frozen. And some part of some banking mishap and they were told, you know, you were the person they could

trust to hold on to their money until they can resolve the current dilemma. It'll be fixed. And then they're more than happy to reward you for your efforts. A distant relative of yours has died. And there was a large inheritance. They'd like to make sure that you get. They need to make sure you're not dead. you're alive or dead. You know, they're just thoughtful like that, you know. And in order to get your hands on the millions, they're going to give you, you know, you just have to give them some personal information, you know, just inconsequential stuff like your social security number, mothers made name, credit card number, expiration date, security, code, bill,

and address. And they'll just take that information and just, you know, attempt to hack your identity and maybe access your online bank information and maybe Robbie blind. Sometimes they need an advance fee. They need you to wire 10,000 to them in order to free the briefcase from those pesky, those pesky customs people because it has 2 million in it. They'd be happiest with that 50-50 with you if they could just get their hands on it. They just don't know anybody else with that kind of cash laying around. You can trust them.

They're a reverend and a doctor. And they have a trustworthy last name, as a last name, and another trustworthy last name, for a first time. First name, the reverend doctor, Johnston Williams. They are four times as trustworthy as the most trustworthy person you've ever met. So how often is this happening? Not surprising to anyone who has an email account, very, very often. 2015 study by the Canadian government revealed that 156 million scam emails were sent globally

every day. 16 million of those daily emails make it through spam filters. 8 million of those emails are actually opened. 800,000 links within those emails are actually clicked and most surprisingly to me 8,000 people end up revealing some kind of personal information to the scammers that the scammers can then use to an attempt to rob the victim in some form of identity theft or some nefarious financial transaction. I guess after the is we getting dumberous time

so okay, episode, I shouldn't be that surprised. This many people are falling for it. If you're poor and gullible and desperate and uneducated enough, not to pick up on the poor grammar of the emails and the ridiculous premise that you have a wealthy relative, you've never heard of that wants to give you money, you can get swindled. And that makes me so angry because I guess

I'm guessing the people getting scammed I probably already incredibly disenfranchised, you know I don't see a lot of neurosurgeons a lot of high-ranking execs getting taken in by this You know people who could actually financially afford to take a big hit No, I probably someone who's already get struggling You know someone who's who's now lost the last 10,000 bucks they have money that they were saving for retirement You know money a family loses when the scammer targets, see Nile Graham on, take sure inheritance.

And so I didn't wonder how much of these people actually getting, because it doesn't say that in the Canadian thing, like how much are they taking? More than I thought, according to an article at geektime.com, cited in a report from ultra-scanned advanced global investigations, Nigerian, excuse me, email scams,

took in a total of $12.7 billion in 2013. Now, after I read into that, read that though, I got to say it didn't seem totally legit to me. And so I dug into ultra scan AGI, a little more. Got the feeling that they themselves is a scam. This tends to be a common thing when you're researching and googling like email scammers, most of the sites you find are just other scammers. It's like a double, it's the double scam. They're looking for people pissed off about getting swindled and they know those people are already fucking gullible. So then those people try and reach out to one of these organizations and in theory it's going to get the money back from them and they just get hit again. Oh God, can you imagine if you just lost money to one of these scams and then these guys scanned you out of even more money under the

pretense of recovering your initially stolen funds? Like I try not to seriously advocate murder, but if someone pretended to be a scam, pretend you didn't see and they scammed you after just being scammed, you should be allowed to kill one employee. Oh, when I research further, it seems that a lot of money really has been taken though. According to Newsweek, I'm guessing a little more reliable source than Ultra Scan AGI. The Federal Bureau of Investigation's Internet Crime Complaint Center, FBI, I've heard of them. Tally 269,422 complaints in 2014, totaling 800,492,073 in losses. According to the report, the center has received 3,175,611 complaints since its establishment

in May 2000. The losses compiled in 2014 are likely much lower than the actual internet crime losses. The report states, quote, only an estimated 15% of the nation's fraud victims report their crimes to law enforcement while the IC3 estimates less than 10% of victims filed directly through www.ic3.gov. So when I look further, confidence fraud slash romance scams, because sometimes these are romantic angle to try and pull off the same type of scam. Made up 86 million, 713,000 and $3 worth of 2014 losses. Victims filed 5,883 confidence fraud complaints.

According to the FBI, scammers cruise dating websites, chat room, social media, for personally identifiable information, you know emails and stuff too. Obviously, you use well-rehearse scripts to attract potential victims, and then they use these scripts, which might involve family tragedies, severe life circumstances, in order to get money from their victims. Just for random facts, women filed 4,000, 88 of these complaints, men filed 1,795. Now that tends to skew a little bit more because of the romance thing. There was other studies that show more men actually are scammed than women by the actual email one.

So if almost $87 million in losses to some type of 419 scammers reported the FBI by a little over 7500 people in the FBI, I think it's only 10% report crimes to that agency. That means the FBI thinks roughly $870 million taken by these scams from a total over $75,000 people, $11,600 a person. And that's US. That's not worldwide. That's US. Not quite the 13 billion that ultra-scan reported, but still a lot of money. Who are these victims? Who's falling for Reverend Dr. Johnson Williams? Yes, choir. I'm just gonna throw that in there. Why not? He likes titles. Well, according to a 2015 AOL.com article

citing a Stanford study, breaking down what typical victims look like, tends to be a white dude. Typical victim of investment fraud is a man. He's educated, financially literate and white, and he's under some financial pressure. Psychologist Laura Carsonson says, damn it.

Feel like I could be next. Desperation makes us do crazy things. Is anyone who's waking up next to someone they didn't even meet until they had 10 drinks already understands. It makes sense to me. I think more often than women, men's egos are kind of tied to making money.

Like the more we make, more we have, the more kind of manly we feel oftentimes. And then you get desperate. You just want that feeling back. And then one of these fuckers gets ya. It tends to be the young, rather than elderly, that surprised me. Contrary to popular wisdom, younger adults are actually more vulnerable than older people according to research by Judy Van Wick, the University of Rhode Island, and Karen A. Mason

of Washington State University in the Journal of Contemporary Criminal Justice. Again, that's way more legit than ultra-scan AGI. People 18 to 25, so do 77% chance of becoming victims compared to people 65 to 75 who had a 44% chance according to a study. So, you know, we're so quick to assume the elderly, at least I am. I think that's ages and I guess. I guess that those stats have a lot to do with life experience. Like the older you get, the more you're aware of how people in the world are full of shit. And I do understand that. Like, I remember doing a bar gig in a story, Oregon. My first time doing stand-up.

First time I worked in the road. It's some red lion hotel lounge bar in this little fishing town. It's truly a hellgick, like a rough little bar show. Half the people are paying attention. Half people are just there, you know, having some drinks. You're not even on a stage, on a fucking dance floor. It's followed by I think some karaoke bullshit or some like 80s dance party afterwards. And after one of these shit shows, this dude approaches me. Says he's development exec for HBO.

And I thought it was like weird that HBO exec would be scouting talent at the red line in a story organ. But you know, I wanted it to be true so bad. I was so, weird that HBO exec would be scouting talent at the red line in a story organ, but I wanted it to be true so bad. I was so desperate. I kind of believed him. You know, he was really kind of talking me up, talking me up, you know, wanted to have a drink or something. And I did have enough sense to not do that. But I still, but then I remember regretting,

I'm like, God, maybe I should have had a drink with him. God, did I just ruin some opportunity with HBO? I remember he really worried about it. And looking back now, it's like, there's no fucking way, there's no way he was working for HBO. Dude, he was some douchebag that was probably his go-to kind of line each week at the red line in.

He was just trying to, I don't know, probably trying to sleep with me, you know? I'll never know for sure what he was. Other than I'm positive, he didn't have shit to do with HBO. And unless his, by HBO, he meant like hunting for butt sex opportunities. Maybe that's another HBO that I wasn't aware of. And yes, butt sex is one word in that acronym. It's the only way it makes sense.

So I do kind of get like, has you get older, you're like, your bullshit detector gets a little more refined. That makes some sense to me. Another thing they said in this study, though, being from Florida puts you at risk, not surprised by that one. Florida is the top state for consumer fraud complaints with about 1,000 complaints,

pretend that 100,000 residents, excuse me, 1,000 per 100,000, according to a report done by 24 or seven Wall Street, based on Federal Trade Commission data. And again, not surprised. A lot of weird shit happens in Florida, like I love Florida actually, but it's a super weird place. It seems like whenever you read a headline about US news about somebody getting high on bath salts, needing somebody's face or getting

arrested for walking naked and drunken like a burger king or some over the top shit like that. I feel like Thombl's always Florida. And another thing is the lonely are victims. The AARP's 2014 reports says that 66% of scam victims say that they quote often are sometimes feel isolated. What's, how far can sad is that? Some poor miserable bastards already alone down in their luck. They get scammed. Just a couple more turd tossed into the shit sandwich. They were already choking down through their sad life.

And they don't even have somebody to talk to about it because they're alone. So vicious cycle, if I get scammed again And I get again that makes sense to me, you know, I know people who just fall for stupid shit because they're fucking sad and lonely There's this comic known for a while not gonna even reference worries from anything You know we sat these internet girlfriends and it was so obvious like you talk it spent hours on the phone with them It was so obvious to everybody but him that it was spend hours on the phone with them and it was so obvious to everybody but him that it was, the person on the other end of the line

was not like the person who was in the photos they were being like, like, he remember he showed me a photo one time of the supposed girlfriend and he would even call her his girlfriend, they'd never met. And it was clearly like one of those photos that you see that comes with the frame in the store.

Like if you went to Target and bought a frame and if one happened to have like a photo already in it, there was already just like just one woman. It was like, it was that photo. It was like like a little airbrushed. Obviously not like a candid cell phone shot. That was one of the pictures he had of her. And I immediately was like,

dude, it's probably not even a woman. It's probably some dude, he was fucking basement. Fucking talkative, he has a feminine voice. And he's got you catfished, because you still goddamn desperate. It is sad, but I know I'm making fun of it. Also, those people just, like I'll read things like this and have a moment of like, who the fuck would fault this? And I'll remember people I've met in life that, oh, that dude.

That's who would fault for this. So, you know what, who the fuck would fall for this? And I'll remember people I've met in life that, oh, that dude, that's who would fall for this. So, you know, it makes some sense to me. And here's what I wondered, this is what I wondered for years on this. This is the most exciting piece of research I found from this episode. I always wondered like, why are people falling for these cams when they are so poorly written? Like how do you not pick up on that? And I did feel a little bit clever

when I found the answer to this question because it was what I hoped it to be. Because part of me also just thought, well maybe these Nigerians just kind of speak in broken English and that's their emails reflect those speech patterns. But then I was like, yeah, but if they're taking a time to do this, wouldn't they also take the time

to kind of mirror how we speak over here It just didn't totally make sense Excuse me. I just came in a nowhere. Well in 2012 Microscope, Microsoft It's a new company that sounds super legit. It's Microsoft computers. I just gave them $10,000 No, in 2012 Microsoft Research released a paper looking at why the Nigerian or 4019 scam, in particular, has persisted over the years, and they found that basically because such a large group of web users have been trained to recognize that scam, the small portion

of people that don't are more likely to ignore the red flags, such as horrible grammar and send money. So a craftier email, a more well-written email, may get the attention of more people, many of those people would turn out to be like false positives who eventually realize this is scam and cut contact. But if you can make the email so poorly written that whoever doesn't fall for that,

keeps talking to you, there's a good chance you're gonna get the money and that's sick, but that's fucking genius. Make so much sense. If the name Reverend Dr. Johnson Williams doesn't give you pause, you're exactly the kind of person who's gonna send a stranger money. Like, this made the entire time suck

for this topic worthwhile to me. You know, again, I just wonder for so long why these emails are written that way. And it also helps explain why I remember one time I started trying to go back at these people with equally poorly written emails just to kind of mess with them, like actually even more over the top and exaggerated than their emails and they never fell for it. They never, what did happen is it pissed them off. And I started getting like five, 10 of these emails an hour

for like, I don't know, two months or something. It took forever to figure out my spam filter and clean all that shit up. So I would recommend don't harass him that way. They're not as dumb as they appear to be. So this is another interesting thing I found in this time's suck is the history of this scam. Like I wondered like how long has this been going on?

I thought it was just a thing that happened with the invention of email. I just figured it started kind of the mid-90s. I don't know why. I never really questioned why it was coming from Nigeria as well. Well, it turns out it goes back way farther than that. The history of the advanced fee scam in its current form

goes at least as far back as the aftermath of the French Revolutionary War at the end of the 18th century in the late 1790s. And it was a letter, and it would typically go something like this, according to this Boston Globe article I read. And the letter addressed to you would arrive describing some aristocrat and exile, say, you know, the Marquis de Blanc, who in escaping from revolutionary violence had thrown a chest full of jewels into a lake. His faithful servant, now riding his heartfelt letter, had come back to retrieve it and unfortunately ended up in prison, oh, a tag napkin. Which is a little help from you, a fellow Frenchman.

To aid in the servant's bail or escape, you'd earn a portion of the loot. That's the word that doesn't get said enough anymore to loot. And just like in today's emails, you know, this ridiculous scheme actually worked. Of 100 such letters sent by French Confidence Trictistors, 20 were always answered, wrote Eugene Videlc, a 19th century French criminal turned detective.

Well, I've also heard the 419 scam, the advance fees, described as a Spanish prisoner scam online. So I looked into that, here's how it got that name. A century after the French Revolutionary War, the scam became even more popular than ever when it was used in the US during the Spanish-American War. Havana and Madrid offered the perfect setting for the letters' promises, remote,

but not inaccessible, exotic, but recognizable, and full of mercenaries, adventurers, and corrupt officers. A detailed daily presence in the pages of Pulitzer's and Hertz newspapers, the war provided in an ideal context for the story of a military man in prison in Spain with money concealed in the US. Say a shipment of Cuban gold, for example, that he can recover, but only with your help. So, this year's been going on for a while.

And so why did it end up in Nigeria? Well, the scam never totally went away after the Spanish-American war. It lived on, around the world in letter form. You know, he used here and there and finally arrived in Nigeria in the 1980s, a period of tremendous, I'm sorry, actually it was before the 1980s. I got very popular in the 80s, actually arrived Nigeria in the 1920s, but in the 80s it wouldn't explode it. There was a period of tremendous economic upheaval in that country over 75% of the government's

income, almost 90% of the nation's gross domestic product, that GDP. At the time was based on oil revenue and when oil prices plummeted in the 80s the nation's economy collapsed, leaving a very corrupt government in charge and millions fighting their survival doing whatever they needed to do to bring in some money including scamming people. During the 80s millions of paper 419 letters millions of them were sent using counterfeit postage all over the world. And so like the Revolutionary War and the Spanish American War, the con fit the context. Victims could be expected to know about the easy money circulating through corrupt oil money, heavy Nigeria.

This is a place they'd heard of, featherbedded development contracts and ministerial slush funds. They'd heard about those things in the news just as they'd known about the military adventures and hidden gold during the Spanish American War. And maybe unlike other war-torn or economically-class countries, Nigeria had been primed for this scam because it already had a long history of doing it going back, as I said just moments ago, to the 1920s. Nigerian 419 scam goes all the way back to 1920 written by P. Crenstill and And I don't know why exactly this stuff at the same time wasn't going on in other African countries. I mean Nigeria does have a very long history of governmental corruption. Maybe maybe that's part of it Certain things just kind of settled in different parts of the world for for whatever reasons

but Crenstall wrote to a contact in the British colony off the Gold Coast today is Ghana, and he launched into a long description of the magical powers that were in his possession, and that could on payment of a fee be used to benefit the correspondent. Crenstall signed himself, P. Crenstall, Professor of Wonders. Well, this wonder, Professor, and what a great title, by the way. What do you do? I'm a professor. What's your area of expertise? Wonder, I have a doctorate in wonder.

How does that work? Are you wondering how it works right now? Yeah, I got you. I see, I made you wonder right there. You don't pull that off without a wonder doctorate. Anyways, this P. Crenstall apparently started sending a lot of these letters. And eventually it was charged with three counts of fraud

under the nation's 419 code. And because he was charged in Nigeria, the corrupt police let him off with a warning. The chief of police actually said he was so impressed with Professor Wander's ability to get out of trouble that he must indeed be magical. Man, if I ever get arrested for a serious crime, I hope I get arrested by a cop like that.

Look, what you did was super fucking illegal. However, I'm impressed by the way you've been trying to talk yourself out of it, and also impressed by how many other times you've been pulled over and just let go with the warning. So, how about another warning? Oh, man, kudos, you're good. I like you, I like your style.

And when others heard about his scam, the money he was making, the fact that he hadn't, that he didn't get in trouble, you know, he didn't get in trouble, you know, punitively by the police. Other people started doing it too. So many people that by the 1940s, the British Department of Posts and Telegraphs,

their post-service began to intercept mail between Britain and its colonies and Nigeria to check it for requests for money that seemed fraudulent. So this was going on a lot. The Postal Service gets involved and it just keeps going on and on like that. And now you have a culture of older experts training younger scammers and eventually an entire subculture of 419 scammers in Nigeria. And then when the 1980s political upheaval occurs, you know, it's like that subculture was just given a giant shot of criminal adrenaline. And you also have Nigeria's capital, LaGos.

LaGos is the largest city in Africa, and now one of the largest urban areas in the world, the population of over 21 million people. In 1950, less than 300,000 people live there. That's fucking crazy. In 1950, you got under 300,000, now you have over 21 million. And the city was not ready for that kind of explosive growth according to an article in the New Yorker Less than 1% of those 21 million people have a toilet connected to an actual sewer system yikes I bet that city smells fantastic in a lot of neighborhoods while there are good neighborhoods and some modern developments

So you do get you know the infrastructure for you know Good Wi-Fi in parts of the city, little internet coffee shops and things. And then, probably with some toilets. Most of it is this huge slum where the police are either not existent or incredibly corrupt. Many of the immigrants who have moved there did so because where they lived before in Africa was even fucking worse. So you have an incredibly overcrowded, underfunded, underdeveloped city administered by a series of corrupt leaders who have pillaged the nation who couldn't give a shit about prosecuting scam artists and that is why the scam remains so firmly embedded in Nigeria today and it's why it's hard to get your money back

You know the local authorities they have a lot more to deal with in this crazy Mad Max type city than email scams That's gonna be super low on their priority list. They don't really give a shit if Some Westerners money is being taken by the Reverend Dr Johnson Wapes. Well, had an offer for this topic. I don't know that I would research logos. What an insane Mad Max type of city it really is. This is, I want to share some more details about life there. This is from a December 2, 2016 article in US News and World Report. Quote, Africa's largest city has been on fire since November 9. Remember, it's a December 2nd report, and this is November 9. Since November 9. That night, a fire broke out in the waterfront community of Adodo, Gabame, and Lagos.

Residents called the police who responded not with fire trucks, but with a bulldozer and more fire. I know that's not funny, but it's so ridiculous. There's a fire in the slums. Should we get the fire trucks? No, no, no, no, no, let's get some gas. Let's really kick this thing into high gear. The state sponsored destruction of a dodo, Gabame, occurred notwithstanding an injunction issued two days earlier,

ordering that no demolitions occur absent due process of law and adequate compensation. Today, a toto gabbama is gone. 30,000 people are homeless, sleeping in canoes or temporary shelters. There are nine confirmed deaths, including two sets of mothers and infants who rush into the water to escape to flames and drowned. Health consequences include severe burns,

typhoid and diarrhea caused by lack of portable water, or potable water and sanitation. The governor of Lago State, Akhenwimi, Abamudu, has stated that the slums of Lago's like a total Gbame are occupied merely by a few sets of people who come into Lago's illegally. This is demonstrably false. Public international organizations like the United Nations and independent fact finders such as Amistigh International have all found at least 30,000 have been displaced in a total of Obama alone, at least 1.1 million inhabitants of Lagos, live in a slum or informal settlement.

Can you imagine the public uproar if that happened in the US or some other developed nation? If the government just set fire, just fucking burned and bulldozed a neighborhood full of projects and like Chicago or New York City, Skid Row and LA. It's another world over there. Like no wonder people have no respect for the law or their government and can care less about scamming. I mean, I mean, they're living in a living hell over there. And it really is so corrupt. Check out these stats. According to Vice President for Africa of the World Bank, Dr. Obey is Equicili, someone with only one title and only one last name, while oil accounted for about 90% of the value of Nigeria's exports over 80% of that money ended up in the hands

of 1% of the population. Ah, the rich get richer man. And over 400 billion of the nation's oil revenue has either been stolen or misappropriated since Nigeria gained independence in 1960. That's a lot of fucking money. It's not like a great place to be a shady accountant. I mean, who's gonna notice you in bezelating, in bezelying, 10 grand here and there,

you know, maybe 50 grand here and there, if they're used to losing billions. So, you know, when you live in a country that burns down its poorest citizens neighborhoods, puts nearly all of his income in the hands of only the wealthiest citizens, has an insanely corrupt police force. On that note, tons of articles

from human rights slash watchdog groups about widespread rivalry, violence, and rapes committed by Nigerian police officers, of course no one's gonna care about scams. If you're witness in extreme absolute poverty, as it's described, cruelty by the hands of your own government and widespread corruption on a daily basis, and you meet a network of people who know

how to take some cash from foreigners. Forners that you'll never have to see, I think most people are gonna be like, yeah, fuck it. Let's do it. Why not take money of some asshole living across the world who, even if I rob and blind, it's still gonna have an air-conditioned apartment, so I don't have to worry about starving, being beaten, fuck them. Part of me definitely gets that.

Desperate times, call for desperate measures. So who are some of these actual scammers? Who are these people? Well, I found, just besides criminals, I found a cool website called motherjones.com. It's a nonprofit site dedicated to socio-political journalism. And that sounds important. Has a bit of a vice feel, maybe not quite the edge,

you know, they put mother in the title to soften it up a bit. You know, mom's watching out for your social justice. And one of the, and one of their journalists, Erica Eichelberger, a woman with most, mother in the title to soften it up a bit, you know? Mom's watching out for your social justice. And one of the, one of their journalists, Erica Eichelberger, a one with most, with one of the most unattractive last names I've ever read aloud. Well, aren't you looking sexy as fuck, Mrs. Eichelberger?

Hmm, that's a, that's a weird sentence. She hung out with a few scammers back in 2014, a couple agreed to talk to her for some money. They wanted $600 to She do an interview. Love that. Of course, they did get her respect. Their commitment to the game. Ever the scammers. She offered them a hundred bucks. They settled on 130 nice work, Erica.

Well, the two people she met were living in a nice duplex in an upscale neighborhood and had learned to scam hanging out with other scammers. See, there's the culture there. When they were growing up in a rural village, hurting cattle and selling bottled water by the side of the road. What stuck out to me was how prevalent scammers seemed to be in the interview that kept referring

like various other scammers that either new personally or heard of, legends about this person getting mad or this, they referenced how much these people made and how much they used to make with scams. It was just part of the culture they grew up. And my favorite part was they didn't consider themselves thieves. It's amazing the lives we tell ourselves, isn't it? The power of human rationalization

never ceases to astonish me. These people, they consider their scams tricking people. And tricking isn't the same as stealing. Uh-uh. If someone's down enough to fall for it, that's on them. I feel like that's a kind of logic, a lot of date rape is probably use, you know?

They're not rapein' anybody, they're just sneakin' some penises into people who they've been able to trick. Grotes. Well, these scammers make a pretty good living. In a country where according to the article, 70% of the population makes less than US $2 a day, a nation of extreme poverty, they each claim to be worth about $6,000 bucks And each own homes worth roughly that's like cash they have and own homes worth roughly 250,000 US dollars and they're both in their mid 30s And they claim to make actually the surprise you most of their money dooping other Nigerians that that part that's that sucks

I thought it was just the Westerners, but you know, Jesus, you poor hungry, can't trust anybody. You know, you're typical Nigerian, god damn. Again though, maybe they don't make as much of their claim. I mean, these are scammers that are being interviewed. It's not like you can trust them. They're quite literally professional liars. And they do also justify their job saying that there are scammers in the highest levels

of the Nigerian government. So basically, if they're doing it, why can't I? And I do get them. I do the more I read about this, the less I kind of despise scammers. It's like, yeah, it's shitty what they're doing. But I do get it partly because I've been to Africa once, I spent a month in South Africa, which I love by the way.

And while South Africa, it's, it's a far different country than Nigeria. It did give me a little bit of perspective on this article. It's like, again, I don't judge them as harsh as I would if I never would have been there, never would have went there. Life is just different there. There's corruption on that continent in general on a scale that we, at least in the US are very unfamiliar with. It's not theoretical.

It's in your face. Like here, it's like, oh, I very unfamiliar with. It's not theoretical. It's in your face. Like here, it's like, oh, I bet the government's stealing this and that. Maybe they are, maybe they're not. You see it directly in Africa, where it's like everywhere, me and the four other comics I was working with, went in like Johannesburg and Durban in Cape Town. We had armed security with us to protect us

from being robbed. I never felt in danger, but you don't always have armed guards in a place that's truly safe. And there were safe neighborhoods, but there was also, you know, you saw, even in the good neighborhoods, a shitload of razor wire and heard security dogs and there were, you know, securities actually one of the one of the main businesses, personal security in that nation. You know, I also saw slums in Johannesburg and Cape Town, unlike anything I've ever seen in this country. Not sure how they compared to the log of slums,

but I don't think you'd get much worse than what I saw. I mean, I saw a few pieces of like flat tin, excuse me, for roof, center blocks, for walls, no electricity, no running water, crandy with tens of thousands of other homes that you'd be embarrassed to call your shed here in the States. And millions live like that. Millions die like that.

Dive curable diseases, malnutrition, violence. You know, theft is often a crime of the desperate. And I saw a lot of fucking desperation there. And a lot of corruption. I remember one morning after a night of going to a club in Joburg, this Australian comic told me that he and this girl who drove him home, they got pulled over. He got, he said he got so scared because all the sudden several officers approached the car, screaming at them and machine guns drawn and pointed at them.

He's losing his shit. She's totally calm. She grew up there. She knew they just wanted to bribe sure enough. And she, and she, I guess, was drunk. Sure enough. She rolls down her window and just gives them some cash and just bribes them.

And then they just go about their day. And sorry about that, that barking, this episode I'm trying to record while my puppy is in the house. And all Penny doesn't give a shit about podcasts. That's one of her least interested subjects as podcasts. Turns out dogs don't care for them at all. But anyway, this is this girl. She just she just gives them cash and they just they just let us left. Yeah. I mean, can you imagine living like that? Yeah. So now we know that these emails come

from Africa. We know who's sending them and why they're sending them. A couple more questions to answer. Does anyone get their money back from these scams? And what do you do if your money is taken? Well, this is a short answer. You don't get your fucking money back ever, not ever. I mean, I'm sure someone somehow may have gotten a tiny bit back, but I can't find a single example in doing a lot of research. I mean, I don't know.

The people who did it may get arrested, but even then, you're not getting your money. So basically, just don't get caught up in this. Odds are, you'll never find out who took your money. Let alone ever get it back. Except that it's gone and just don't waste more your life on this fool's errand. Don't get caught up by ultra-scan HGI.

Who watch, watch, they tend to be a totally legit organization than sue me for defamation. While you can't get your money back, some people have figured out a way to get back at some of the scammers in a different way and it's called scam baiting. I remember hearing about this on this American life episode years ago, it was very entertaining.

Basically, which is an NBR show, if you don't know, but scam baiting is when you try to scam the scammer and it's pretty funny. It's like you respond to the initial email in a way that makes you sound willing and gullible, but don't go over the top like I did. Don't just, if they come at you with Reverend Doctor, don't come back at them with fireman,

Reverend Doctor Forest Ranger. Just seem genuinely interested in their offer. And then you try to get them to lose money while trying, while they're trying to get your money. You can say, you'd love to get them to lose money while trying, while they're trying to get your money. Like, you know, you can say, like, you know, like you'd love to give them $10,000 to deal with a lawyer who needs that in order to cover the fees and current and release the $2 million to you and them.

You're gonna split, of course, you know, who wouldn't want to pay $10,000 for a million? That sounds great. Sounds almost too good to be true. But you're gonna do it, but you just, you can't do an electronic transfer. You just don't feel comfortable with that. And it turns out you're actually head to Nigeria.

And so you're headin' there anyway, and you got an aunt over there and you just wanna give them the money in person. No big deal. You're excited. So you pick a time in a place, somewhere a few hours from where they live, so they have to take a little trip to get there.

Maybe somewhere dangerous, if you feel especially cruel, put them in harm's way, and you have family there. You have your aunt, and you can't wait to meet them. Yeah, you gave them a cell phone number for them to call, they show up at the meeting place and total bummer.

Your aunt fell down and was rushed to the hospital. Oh man, you're with her right now and you know what, you're gonna have to meet them the next day, that's it. You know, they should just stay the night there. You'll be there the next day. Just hold on, you got your 10 grand in your briefcase. You're bringing it tomorrow. Hold your horses, Dr. Reverend Johnson Williams. So to help cover their expenses, you're willing

to give them $20,000, right? You're going to sweeten the deal. And then just hold on for that one more day. Okay. And then when they text you the next day from the drop spot, ah, shit. Your stupid aunt was transported back to the original location You were confused. Ah shit. She could just die and get it over with. It'd be so much easier She's not even your favorite aunt. Can they meet at the previous spot and you just do that over and over again and Make up these stories and you just try to give them to spend as much of their money as possible And that's what that that's what I listen to on that this American life episode. These guys have these poor scammers, I say poor, welcome, bounce and all over the place.

I mean, I wanted to feel bad. Some people felt bad. I remember about that episode. There was a little controversy about it. Like, is that okay to do? I think it's bad as things are over there. They are still trying to take your money. So I feel like that live by the store, die by the store.

You know, it's like I'm not going to feel any worse for a scam or getting scammed than I do about a pedophile getting, you know, entrapped by Chris Hanson. All right. So now we got a good feel for the old 419. The old advanced fee scam is time for some top five takeaways. Time suck, top five takeaways. Number one, pay extra attention to something that feels like a scam even if you're a young lonely white man under a lot of financial pressure

Living in Florida. You could not be more psychologically primed for somewhere to take advantage of you. Number two, you don't get your money back. Actually most of the websites I came across that advertise themselves as a service Who's specialty was to get your money back looked like another scam themselves. So cut your losses, except that you are, in fact, an extremely gullible ding dong dip shit, and move on with your sad life. Number three, you may not want to move to Lagos, Nigeria, and if you already live there, you should think about moving out. You should think really hard about even setting foot in Nigeria. The US State Department warns about frequent pirate attacks in the ocean around Nigeria,

staying away from crowded public places such as churches, mosques, the airport, shopping centers, nightclubs, and every other place you go to sightseer have a good time because of terrorist attacks and extremist groups like Boko Haram. And they also say there's a good chance you'll be kidnapped, robbed, beaten, and or killed in the other parts of the country. And if you're still thinking ahead and there, they added not so many words, that if something bad does happen to you over there, tough shit, they warned you not a lot they can do about it.

I mean odds are, statistically, you'd probably still be fine if you head over there or if you live there, but it still doesn't make it a good idea. It's like not using a condom on a one night stand. Statistically, you probably won't get an STD or end up with a baby, but no one in the right mind thinks you're making a solid life choice. Number 4.

That email promised you loads of money is too good to be true every fucking time. You know no one who's gotten a random email that they weren't expecting promising them loads of money from someone they never met who actually got that money and you never will because it won't happen ever. Doesn't matter how down on your luck or lonely you are, strangers don't give you large sums of money and they especially don't take some of your money to give you that more money. And finally number five, while I don't approve of email scamming and I want to feel more like superior to the people doing it I also haven't grown up in Nigeria. Seems like a pretty shitty place to be a kid. Recent BBC report found that over 60% of the country

was living in quote, absolute poverty. What a horrible term. Absolute poverty. As in, you can't get more in povers. You can't be more poor. In certain regions of the country, absolute poverty rates are over 85%.

It is one of the highest murder rates in the world, 20 out of every 100,000 people are murdered, worse than Chicago, which has made headlines for being an especially murderous part of this country. Terrorist group, Bocahram, regularly kidnapped children, dustings like that, blows up places. You remember headlines about them taking nearly 300 young girls from a school in 2014, over 200 are still missing. They terrorized villages, murdered thousands. Apparently many of the police officers there are corrupt and somewhat rapy. Came across a lot of articles referencing

women being raped by the Nigerian police. Hard to be a worse police officer than that. Officer I've been robbed. Well, you've been robbed. I wouldn't worry about that. Robert is about to be the least of your problems. Yikes. If I grew up in absolute poverty,

had a few, you know, friends murdered, had some family members kidnap by terrorists, knew a few girls right by the police, I think I'd be okay with making some email money. Off of somebody dumb enough to not think it's weird for someone to refer to themselves as a reference doctor. Time suck, tough, five, take away. Well now you know, all you ever need to know about those Nigerian emails you've been getting.

You also know how to have a dog named Penny. And so we don't leave this episode on a down note about poverty, abuse, rape, and corruption. Let's take a second to remember how God damn funny these emails can be. If you don't click on them and lose any money, they can really put a smile on your face. You know, maybe we're having a bad day. With their ridiculous promises and broken English, always made better by a dramatic piano melody. This message just came in as I was finishing my research and I hope it makes you smile as hard as it made me smile. It touches on so many of the EFCC. I am Mr. Ibrahim Mustafa Magu, the chairman of Economic and Financial Crime Commission EFCC.

EFCC in alliance with Economic Community of West African states, ECOWAS, with head office here in Nigeria, we have been working towards the eradication of fraudsters and scam artists in western part of Africa, with the help of the United States government and the United Nations, and some corrupt official administrators, Mr. Ibrahim Lamord, has been sacked, who happened to be the former EF-CC chairman. We have been able to track down so many of the scam artists in various parts of West African countries, which includes Nigeria, Republic of Benin, Togo, Ghana, Camernaun, and Senegal.

Lots of misspellings here, so many. And they are all in our custody here in Lagos, Nigeria. We have been able to recover so much money from these scam artists. The United Nations Anti-Crime Commission and the United State government have ordered the money recovered from the scammers to be shared among 100 lucky people around the globe. What a nice round number, just 100 lucky people. The email is being directed to you because of your email address was found in one of the scam

artists, file and computer hard disk in our custody here in Nigeria. It comforts me to hear the word Nigerian repeated so many times. And with the information gathered, with the information garnered, I think you may have gathered. From this scam, artist, you noticed that you have been scammed of so much money. I-I actually didn't notice that at all.

And have decided to compensate you with a little token to recover the loss of your fund. You are therefore being compensated with a total sum, $2.5 million. We have also arrested all who claimed they are barresters, bank officials, inheritance. Lottery claim agents who has money for transfer or want you to be next to Ken of such funds, which does not exist. Thank God someone's finally not just trying to scam me. And whose job title is inheritance? Since your name appeared among the lucky beneficiaries, we, who will receive a compensation of US $2.5 million.

Why am I doing a weird European accent? We have made a arrangement to register an online banking through our global bank, where you will have full access to your online banking account fund, to transfer your fund personally to your private bank account with no complication of things or questioning. Thank God if there was going to be complication of things I was out of here. As the account will be fully registered in your name, feel free to contact the processing officer, Miss Esther Immanuel, all caps. The online banking processing, it has made much easier for you to transfer your fund to

your private bank account personally to avoid any delay or complication of things. With this online banking transfer processing, you can transfer the maximum amount of US 500,000 daily. Slash install mentally until the total amount of your compensated slash deposited but transferred and completely paid to you hmm I I didn't feel comfortable giving five hundred thousand dollars, but if I can do it mentally if I can just transfer with my mind I'm open to it and also if you choose to receive your payment via ATM card it's still accepted so get back to her with your choice payment we guarantee your safety and wish you the best of luck

oh okay it's guaranteed. So maybe this looks it. Best regard Mr. Ibrahim Mustafa Magu, Chairman, Economic and Financial Crime Commission, EFCC, Foreign Operations Department, Lagos Nigeria. Oh thank God there's so many words there it makes me comforted. Well that's it. That's it, you guys, and thanks for listening. Thank you for all the wonderful reusing in two on iTunes. And for telling your friends about the podcast, the word is spreading. I love all the emails, especially about just people being excited to just learn something

in a fun way. You know, learn some random trivia, I had somebody email me, so I'm blanking your name about the, they, they share the, they listen to the podcast with their friend brothers and then all like kind of discuss it afterwards, which I just think is fucking awesome. And and also a lot of people have been on the comment boards under the episodes, dropping comments on timestackpodcast.com and people have added their own information, further information about certain episodes. So check that out. You can find more stuff sometimes. And finally, you know, go check out some tour dates at dncomas.tv. Head to timesockpodcast.com for links to the tour dates also.

If you wanna go through there, you can find out when I'm coming near your city. And Mr. Ebrahim Mustafa Magu and Reverend Dr. Johnson Williams, if you're listening over there in Lagos, stay safe and thanks for the laughs. Have a great week, everybody. you