Who Would You Report This To?

[Deleted User]

fluffnutter wrote: »

I probably wouldn't bother. I'd just bin it. This type of thing is fairly common and there's enough public knowledge for most people to know it's a scam and ignore it. Those that don't ignore stuff like this despite the warnings are sadly deluded and beyond help unfortunately.

Or vulnerable and in need of help

Money-Saving-King

Cooper18 wrote: »

All these should be reported to Action Fraud. It takes seconds to do it and if it stops some poor gullible elderly person from being conned its worth a few seconds of your time.

Agree with all the other posters, they come from overseas, there's nothing Action Fraud can do. Like said above it just clogs up the system.

RuthnJasper

Send it to www.419eater.com. They'll know what to do with it... Otherwise, don't worry about it.

typistretired

I keep getting emails in my spam folder from someone pretending to be from either Santander, Natwest, Lloyds and other banks saying I need to verify my details. I tried forwarding them to the email address given on action fraud site and I got a
Delivery Status Notification (Failure)

Paul_Varjak

tesuhoha wrote: »

Hi

I have received the following email

This is a personal email directed to you, My wife and i won a Jackpot Lottery

of £148.6 Million Pounds on 14 August 2012, and have voluntarily decided to donate

the sum of £1,500,000.00 GBP to you as one our lucky beneficiary as part of our

own charity project to improve the lot of 15 unknown lucky individuals all over the

world.we decided to make sure this is put on the internet for the world to see in other to

relinquish any doubts

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2012/aug/14/british-euromillions-jackpot-winners-revealed

Please provide the following information

=======================================================================

*Full Name:

*Telephone Number:

*Age:

*Country:

=======================================================================

Best Regards

Gillian and Adrian Bayford

This is a scam. I want to report it but not sure who to.

http://www.lottery.co.uk/news/euromillions-winners-victims-of-scam-letter-2615.asp

It says here to report it to the police but I am not sure they would want to be bothered.

Advance Fee fraudsters (also known as 419 fraud) will use any ploy. Often they will pretend to be relatives of a dead person, a representative of the FBI, a banker, doctor, clergyman, solicitor, barrister etc.

This particular fraud is already known about and has been publicised in the press. No doubt, there are umpteen Nigerians sitting in internet cafes right now now, all pretending to be the Bayfords...

https://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&cad=rja&ved=0CDMQFjAA&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.hoax-slayer.com%2Fbayford-advance-fee-scam.shtml&ei=-k1xUcHPCerJ0QXJzYGYCw&usg=AFQjCNG6LD6Oza195h_6VXUYMMpeB29WPg&bvm=bv.45373924,d.d2k

Communicate with them long enough and you will catch them out - they often change the spelling of their name in subsequent emails or change their name altogether!

One Nigerian I strung along for a while seemed unsure if his name was William or Williams but he did say that he was travelling to Bangkok soon so he needed an urgent reply.

So, I replied saying: Well, if you are going to Bang c0ck in Thailand you must surely know how many Willys you have.

RuthnJasper

Paul_Varjak wrote: »

Advance Fee fraudsters (also known as 419 fraud) will use any ploy. Often they will pretend to be relatives of a dead person, a representative of the FBI, a banker, doctor, clergyman, solicitor, barrister etc.

This particular fraud is already known about and has been publicised in the press. No doubt, there are umpteen Nigerians sitting in internet cafes right now now, all pretending to be the Bayfords...

https://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&cad=rja&ved=0CDMQFjAA&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.hoax-slayer.com%2Fbayford-advance-fee-scam.shtml&ei=-k1xUcHPCerJ0QXJzYGYCw&usg=AFQjCNG6LD6Oza195h_6VXUYMMpeB29WPg&bvm=bv.45373924,d.d2k

Communicate with them long enough and you will catch them out - they often change the spelling of their name in subsequent emails or change their name altogether!

One Nigerian I strung along for a while seemed unsure if his name was William or Williams but he did say that he was travelling to Bangkok soon so he needed an urgent reply.

So, I replied saying: Well, if you are going to Bang c0ck in Thailand you must surely know how many Willys you have.

That's the sort of thing that 419Eater does! Please be warned though, folks, 419 scammers are SERIOUSLY nasty (and certainly not the poor, frail, defrauded souls they claim to be).

NEVER do any winding-up (aka "Scam-Baiting") of these folks on an email address or any other way that can be traced back to you or your family, or allow yourselves to fall for the heartrending pleas of poverty and despair.

Some examples of the latter that didn't end well for people who were neither gullible nor stupid: http://www.419eater.com/html/ethics.htm

And a terribly tragic example of what happened to a kind-hearted person who believed the scammers: http://www.fraudwatchers.org/forums/showthread.php?t=55789

Scam-Baiting is one way to deal with the wretched 419 Lads, but if you go down that road, please make sure you do it carefully and safely.

Paul_Varjak

Scambaiting is fun once or twice but it soon gets very boring.

I am not sure whether I get any 419 emails these days because I never even bother to sort through all the junk emails trying to sell me Viagra (at one time 300+ per day)

RuthnJasper

Paul_Varjak wrote: »

Scambaiting is fun once or twice but it soon gets very boring.

I am not sure whether I get any 419 emails these days because I never even bother to sort through all the junk emails trying to sell me Viagra (at one time 300+ per day)

Totally agree! I get those Viagra ones too but, being a young lady, I don't think they'd be of much use...

Shiver MeTimbers was the master of scambaiting (not to impugn your work, sir), but he's gone quiet now; can't say I blame him.

gb12345

RuthnJasper wrote: »

Totally agree! I get those Viagra ones too but, being a young lady, I don't think they'd be of much use...

Shiver MeTimbers was the master of scambaiting (not to impugn your work, sir), but he's gone quiet now; can't say I blame him.

Shiver hasn't baited for a number of years, but he still pays the occasional flying visit to eater. The site has evolved now though, it's not just about scam baiting but also closing down scammers web sites and warning/advising victims through the ScamWarners web site.

fluffnutter

Domino9 wrote: »

Or vulnerable and in need of help

Possibly. And I know that my comment might have appeared unsympathetic, which I'm not really. I think it's terrible that people get sucked into these types of scam but it's quite interesting to dig a little deeper into their rationales and psyches.

We all have a picture of a little old lady being taken advantage of; she's not all the ticket and she gives her life savings away to these criminals. That can happen no doubt, but what's more common is that people simply will not be told. For whatever reason, possibly some sort of delusionary greed, many people who get taken in by these scams deliberately refuse to heed warnings. It's in a similar vein to conspiracy theorists - they believe what they want to believe and who cares about evidence.

I suspect it would rapidly get frustrating trying to convince someone who didn't want to listen that these types of scam never end well. Yes, people do need help, but not because they're simply vulnerable but because they're mentally ill and that's a lot more difficult to tackle.