FRAUD Alert!

[Art]

Both of these scams have been traced to Nigeria. The famous email variation that Shawn speaks of has even resulted in the deaths of a few "less than street-smart" people who have actually went there to follow up on the progress of their deal.

Here is the URL which talks about the famous Nigerian "overcharging" scam and the famous Nigerian email scam:

http://www.fraudaid.com/ScamSpeak/Nigeri...aud-01.htm

Shawn's tip #1 to avoid being ripped off. Don't be a stupid moron!!

There are many "good" scams out there but this is not one of them. In fact, that one is very stupid - here's an MO for nearly five grand for an order worth less than 1/10th of that, please wire me the change!!!

Combined with the initial bad grammar this has all the hallmarks of the famous Nigerian frauds - for those of you who haven't yet received an email (or in the old days a letter about this), I have gotten over a dozen myself - it is a scam where someone is trying to liberate money from Nigeria or another African country. You will get a huge chunk of it for helping them launder it. The catch is they just need a few grand first to pay bank fees. So send them several thousand dollars and they will send you your hundreds of thousands in the near future - really.

I feel a great deal of sympathy for those who are victim to genuine frauds - bad checks, counterfeit money and money orders, credit card number, theft etc. Some of it can't be avoided. But if anyone falls victim to something as stupid as the one tried in the article above - come on!!

Shawn