In all likelihood, there are many people who do not report their losses to authorities.
This is usually due to either fear of implicating themselves in a fraud being committed on the government of Nigeria or because of the embarrassment from being deceived.
They are often reluctant to cooperate with police because they believe that they could be prosecuted, either in their own country or in Nigeria and may also fear reprisals being directed against them by the organized criminals involved.
Other problems which plague investigations of this nature are bank confidentiality and the fact that courts are less likely to empathize with victims if greed was the motivation for falling for the scam in the first place.
The Nigerian Federal Police have set up a special unit to investigate the scheme but due to the reluctance of victims to travel to Nigeria, prosecutions are difficult to institute.
In a bid to outsmart Nigerian police surveillance, some of the perpetrators are now operating in the nearby Republic of Benin, Ghana, and Burkina-Faso where foreign nationals now fly into in compliance with the directives of their Nigerian invitees.
Accordingly, Interpol has now extended its surveillance to these countries, while alerting their counterparts about the activities of the fraudsters.
A few years ago, Nigerian Letter Scams constituted the third biggest consumer fraud on the Internet, trailing auctions and the sale of merchandise, according to the National Consumer League.
The Secret Service, under its mandate to protect U.S. currency and financial institutions, has since 1995 been working with the U.S. Department of Commerce, and Nigerian and other foreign authorities to try to counter the operations, which range from the crude to quite sophisticated.
They indicate that they get 13,000 complaints a month from people who have received the dubious solicitations, about 80% of which now come by e-mail.
In the past three years, the U.S. victims who have come forward state they have been swindled out of $100 million, according to the Secret Service, but as most fraud victims are too embarrassed to come forward this figure likely represents a tiny fraction of the actual losses.
If you have been victimized by one of these schemes, please forward appropriate written documentation to the:
United States Secret Service,
Financial Crimes Division,
419 Task Force
950 H Street, NW,
Washington, DC 20001-4518
Or telephone
(202) 406-5850
Fax:
(202) 406-8203,
(202) 406-6390
You can report this crime online to the
U.S. Treasury Department Secret Service (Nigerian Frauds)
E-mail
Materials sent in should still be labeled No Financial Loss - For Your Database if that is the case and Loss - and whether or not there is a US Connection - if there was a loss. If you are from outside the US, you should also note the country you are from.
If you receive such a letter in the mail, do not respond. Send it to:
Inspection Service Operations Support Group
Two Gateway Center, 9th Floor
Newark, NJ 07175-0001
Anyone in the UK receiving such a letter or e-mail is advised not to reply and forward the correspondence to the
National Criminal Intelligence Service,
PO Box 8000,
London SE11 5EN
Or by e-mail to 419@spring39.demon.co.uk
Specialist Crime OCU Fraud Squad
Wellington House, 67-73 Buckingham Gate,
London, SW1E 6BE
+44 (0) 20 7230 1220
www.met.police.uk/fraudalert
fraud.alert@met.police.uk
PhoneBusters - Reporting Canadian-based telemarketing frauds and Nigerian Fraud.
South African Police
Contact: Captain SC Schambriel
Commercial Crime, Head Office
Telephone number (012) 339 1203
Facsimile number (012) 339 1202
To date, it remains accurate to say that in the vast majority of cases, since the authorities will not recover it for you, once you lose money to the 419ers you will never see it again.
Recovery Scams
Reports received by INTERPOL indicate that the criminals are becoming so brazen and confident that they are contacting earlier victims of the fraud.
Then, posing as Nigerian government officials investigating the fraud in a so-called attempt to get the victims' money back, request payment of an up-front fee.
