E-Mail Scams, Part I: Somebody Is Trying To Get Money Out Of Their Country

This is far and away the most popular category of e-mail scam. It's hard to believe anybody ever falls for it, but they do. Apparently the world is filled with huge secret caches of millions of dollars -- and they tend to fall into the hands of people who, for some reason, aren't able to deal with it themselves and need the help of a friendly American stranger!

MY NAME IS MRS.LARISA SOSNITSKAYA, PERSONAL SECRETARY TO MR.BORIS MIKHAIL KHODORKOVSKY,THE ARRESTED CHAIRMAN/CEO OF YUKOS OIL AND BANK
MENATEP SPB IN RUSSIA WHO IS PRESENTLY IN JAIL.AFTER SEARCHING THROUGH THE BOOKS OF YOUR COUNTRY'S CHAMBERS OF COMMERCE AND INDUSTRIES HERE IN RUSSIA I AM CONTACTING YOU TO ASSIST ME TO RE-PROFILE THE FUNDS AND EQUALLY INVEST SAME ON HIS BEHALF.THE TOTAL AMOUNT OF FUNDS TO BE RE-PROFILLED IS FORTY SIX MILLION DOLLARS (USD$46,000,000.00) AND YOU WILL BE PAID 20% FOR YOUR MANAGEMENT SERVICES.

Dear Friend, Greetings to you and your family. My name is  Ali Ibrahim I am a British and serving in the US Military in the 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiments, Patrols Tail Afar, in Iraq. I am desperately in need of assistance and I have summoned up courage to contact you. I am presently working in Iraq and I found your contact particulars in an address journal. I am seeking your assistance to evacuate the sum of US$8.523 Million Dollars) Eight Million five Hundred Thousand And Twenty Three Dollars  to the States or any safe country of your choice,

Greeting,  Compliment of the season, you may be surprised to receive this mail from me since you do not know me personally I am CHAN LEE, the scrutiny officer of Bank of China offshore payment office in Hongkong. Due to the high rate of corruption going on in the world,we have been mandated to pay all overdue payment to all our foreign contractors, By virtue of my position in this committee, I and my colleagues has been able to negotiate out for our self the sum of USD$8.4 million united state Dollars which was packaged in a box and  deposited to a diplomatic courier company as a family valuable  which will be delivered through a diplomatic means out of the country.

Hello, > Do accept my sincere apologies if my mail does not meet your> personal ethics although, I wish to use this medium to get > in touch with you first because it's fastest means. I am an > external auditor of a well known Bank here in the United > Kingdom. > In one of our periodic auditing I discovered a dormant > accounts with holding balance of 10,000,000 (Ten Million > British Pounds) which has not been operated for the past > three years. From my investigations and confirmations, the > owner of this account, a foreigner by name Mr.Gregory > B.Wilson died in plane crash in July 19,2003 and since then > nobody has done anything as regards the claiming of this > money because he has no family members who are aware of the > existence of neither the account nor the funds. > I have secretly discussed this matter with a top senior > minister official of the federal ministry of finance here> and we have agreed to find a reliable foreign partner to > deal with us...

Hello, Although you might be apprehensive about my email as we have not met before,My name is Mr Song Li le I work with the Hang Seng Bank.There is the sum of $19,500,000.00 in my bank"Hang Seng Bank", Hong kong. There were no beneficiaries stated concerning these funds which means no one would ever come forward to claim it. That is why I ask that we work together so as to have the sum transfered out of my bank into your account.

Hello,  I am Mr. Niang Madicke, i work with one of the big banks here in Dakar,Senegal. My apologies if you find my mail intruding.I do not mean to offend you but only wish to use this medium to propose a business transaction to you which i believe would be of benefits to both of us if you agree to work with me.... [Assurances here that this is not a hoax] ...  The total amount involved is around (six million US dollars)and all i need from you is to help me get the funds over to you safely,i have everything all worked out and there would be no risk or danger in this transaction.

Dear Friend, Please take some time off your busy schedule to read and respond to this email as soon as possible. I am serving in Iraq (Mosul), I will need your assistance to take care of some financial matters for me, and of course you will be adequately compensated with 40% as your share for rendering this assistance. I have to urgently evacuate money, totaling US$33,700,000(thirty three million, seven hundred thousand US dollars) clean legal notes, and all in US$100 bills out of here to a safe place, having found a secure way to do so.

Comments

[BennyNg]

Over the past one year, I have received about 5 of these nonsense emails. Four of them purportedly from Nigeria and one from the UK. I played along with one of them to see what they wanted. Eventually, they asked me to talk to their attorney in Hong Kong to sign some "papers" and to transmit US3,000 to him (attorney) as "processing fees". I ended this "transaction" by sending to them a scam report which I had seen on the Internet. They never emailed back. Hmmm...people will do just about anything for money.

The serious money is at CITY HALL