Nigerian Car, Room And Money Scam
In my mind I design the imaginary reader of Sirharris.com, I like to consider you creative, full of hopes - perhaps even a dreamer, no? Maybe misunderstood, but largely so full of hidden potential no one could be blamed for underestimating your capabilities.
I also assume you to be suitably knowledgeable regarding your safety and personal information online. For instance, I'd expect you to be familiar with the Nigerian Money Scam. It's a well known trick, no one just gives you cheques for large amounts of money, it is obvious.
It figures that there would be derivatives of this type of fraud because good ideas don't appear as frequently as poor ones re-engineered. If you are selling a car there is the African Car Buying Scam and if you are renting a room/flat/shoebox there is the Tenant Scam.
For those that don't mind a deluge of expletives in their good advice J-Walk posted a link to a complete run down of a Nigerian scam at Truthhurts.org, this one has the bitter-sweet addition of the revenge methods used after the predator was downgraded to the prey, making for rewarding reading.
You have made me very happy by posting this - by an odd coincidence I received an 'african car-buying scam' email this very morning, presumably from details posted on autotrader. Luckily I greeted it with 'that's too good to be true' suspicion and responded asking for more info. Not a scam I've come across before.
Results from autotrader ad so far: three phone calls from other companies wanting me to pay to advertise my car with them too; one scam email; no real interest. Sigh.
Posted by
Ally | 1:23 PM
Apparently online vehicle sellers in the UK are a specific target of these scammers, glad to hear you dodged their ploy with a little applied intuition.
Best of luck with getting (useful) interest in your car.
Posted by
Adrian | 3:16 PM