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Oh boy do I feel for the guy that has just lost over $150,000 in an internet inheritance scam. (www.windsorstar.com/Leamington+loses+Nigerian+scam/1173799/story.html) These scams are varied in their set-up but all have a common theme – a big payout!”.  The main thrust of it is you have to pay certain legal fees, processing documents, conversion fees, etc before the fictitious funds can be released. Once you have contacted these people they will empty your credit cards and bank accounts with the promise of millions only a few steps away.

My partner received an e-mail from some dubious bank in the congo claiming that we could help them to repatriate funds by moving huge sums of money through our account and be paid a few million in return. Utter bull-flop at a glance. I checked out the keywords on google and found plenty of information about this type of scam in a few minutes and we left it at that.

Now my heart goes out to anybody who is taken in and subsequently ripped off by these people, but really how dumb do you have to be?? I would have thought that before you even answered the e-mail that a few alarm bells may be ringing and at least a google search done to check it out?? The guy in question actually got systematically ripped over the course of a year!! Various different sums of money were demanded for various bull reasons and our man just kept on giving the money. Not only did he spend his own money but he also borrowed from friends and relations all over the place. Didn’t any of them want to know a little about the investment before handing over bags of hard earned cash? The answer is obviously no and the reasons behind that are maybe a sign as to why and how these rip-offs work.

The more you say to someone $12,000,000 is waiting to go into your account, and the more bull-flop you can put together to back up the original bull-flop then the less likely “someone” is likely to want to listen to common sense, reason or logic. Finding that “someone” is what these people do. They spam hundreds of thousands of e-mail accounts daily until they get a bite and then WHAM!!, the bull-flop machine really kicks into gear and the demands for payments and fees to make this dream reality start to roll in.

Bottom line here is, if it is too good to be true then it probably is just that. Check out web forums on the subject of these scams and educate yourself before contacting anyone. In fact it would be better to contact the authorities and set up a sting operation, get some great media coverage and become a hero for the people. Whatever you do DON’T give these people one brass nickel of your hard earned cash!!