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Why Do Nigerian Scammers Say They Are from Nigeria? (2012)
- serg_chernata 10y agoFor this same reason, ads that advertise miracle cures, tricks and dates tend to have spelling errors and terrible graphics. They do NOT want to attract any attention from people who see right through it.
- LoSboccacc 10y agoah! I never looked at it that way
- Aelinsaar 10y agoExactly. They prey on the weak, the disabled, the mentally ill, the old and isolated, and the desperate.
- pmcollins 10y agoI never noticed the terrible graphics nor spelling errors. I must be one of the idiots. :-)
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- Razengan 10y agoThat is more likely just a result of the people available to them for drawing/writing those ads, i.e. in non-English communities, rather than a willfully intended effect. Haven't you seen all the legit Chinese/Japanese/Indian/etc. ads in their home countries with spelling errors and "terrible graphics?" It's even somewhat of a meme [1] especially some of the stuff written on their t-shirts. [1] https://www.reddit.com/r/engrish https://www.reddit.com/r/engrish
- siegecraft 10y agoWhile I can't say for sure in this case, there are plenty of examples where ads are dumbed down because otherwise they don't appeal to the target market. Besides, if your target is dumb/gullible people, why take the risk of wasting a click on a smart person who you won't convert anyway?
- barrkel 10y agoAnecdata: once upon a time, I got into a conversation with the chap writing the sign outside a restaurant in Morocco, with the dishes of the day. With a smile on his face, he pointed out a spelling mistake on the sign: it was one he made deliberately, because he found (or believed) that more customers came in with the mistake than without. Less professional, more informal vibe? My whole trip to Morocco was very enlightening. The locals were extremely sharp WRT tourists and word got around surprisingly quickly. It's foolish to leap from an economy's development level to the intelligence or education of individuals within it. Economies usually suffer for more structural reasons.
- dasboth 10y ago"he found (or believed) that more customers came in with the mistake than without" I love this piece of (unintentional?) data-driven decision-making!
- blowski 10y agoI used to work for a price comparison website in the UK. After a big redesign which took them from being a horrendous mess to "glitzy web-2.0 style" (this was 2006) their conversion rates went down. They did some user research, and a lot of users said they trusted the site less after the redesign, because it now looked more like a typical advertising business.
- vocatus_gate 10y agoI worked for a sketchy MMO site back in the day (MMOEdge), and my friend who ran the site paid $20k for a very professional and slick-looking pre-built site from a team in Australia. It looked really good, much better than the old amateur-looking site that was currently running. But when he switched to it, he found conversion rates went down, by quite a bit actually. We couldn't figure it out and eventually switched back to the old "cheap" looking site, and traffic was restored. There's something about looking TOO professional that turns people away, I guess.
- 099182919 10y ago
- tormeh 10y agoI read an interview with a woman in the industry. She was a native speaker and she had instructions to use spelling errors.
- heeen2 10y agoI read an interview with a professional designer of ads on porn sites (maybe in wired?), she said they are crappy and amateurish on purpose. I'd provide a source but this is not something I will google at work.
- mabbo 10y agoIt can actually work both ways. Imagine 100 new scammers start posting whatever they want on the internet. The ones who post with perfect English get lots of people replying, but most of the victims realize it's a scam quickly. The ones who post with bad English get fewer people replying, but those who do are the most likely to fall for the scam. You have a lovely Darwinian scenario here in which the highest return on investment comes from those with lower skill levels.
- 13of40 10y agoFor a long time, I wondered why all of the orgone / chemtrail / crystal worship web sites seemed like they followed a stylistic theme -- black background, spinning gifs, centered text in different colors and stlyes -- like the same schizophrenic guy made all of them. I went to dig up some citations just now, and it seems like the proliferation of cheap web page templates has fixed that, though.
- VintageCool 10y agoThat was the geocities style. Maybe the first generation of conspiracy web sites on the Internet created a cultural anchoring effect? Or maybe it just took a decade to update or replace the first generation of sites?
- zuminator 10y agoIt's also the same rationale behind the rude "construction worker" catcall. Although you can tell quite a bit about a person by their gait and attire, the false positive rate is high, so it's doubtful a man will learn enough just by watching to make it worth his while to approach a stranger in the street for a sexual encounter. But whistling and making lewd remarks instantly winnows out any "difficult" (which is to say assertive, intelligent or self-respecting) women, leaving the most willing and easily pliable as the ones most likely to respond positively.
- geon 10y agoI never thought of it like that. So it's not just a numbers game.
- walrus01 10y agoBasically the caveman version of the PUA approach. Be willing to make a boorish fool of yourself, have no shame in what you're doing and some percentage of responses will be positive.
- aj7 10y agoGood analogy!
- rahimnathwani 10y agoA scammer from anywhere can (should?) claim to be Nigerian, for the same reasons.
- Avalaxy 10y agoLink is broken, Google cache doesn't have it. Mirror?
- damian2000 10y agoLikely the answer here ... http://security.stackexchange.com/questions/96121/why-do-phishing-emails-have-spelling-and-grammar-mistakes http://security.stackexchange.com/questions/96121/why-do-phi... This may well be for the same reason as many scammers rely on the tired old 'Nigerian Prince' strategy: by self-selecting for gullible targets, they can be more efficient. In phishing, as in scams, sending the initial batch of emails is the easy part. The hard part is coaxing information out of the target (which can require a concerted exchange of emails). That can represent a significant investment of time. As a result, it's really important to ensure that the people you correspond with may actually give you the information that you're after. It can therefore be advantageous to send a badly-drafted email, on the basis that the people who respond to that are likely to be gullible enough to be phished.
- athenot 10y agoIt would be interesting to deploy a network of bots that responds to those scams, posing as gullible targets. That would then significantly increase the workload of scammers and reduce their availability to conduct scams on actual people. Thoughts?
- cpfohl 10y agoDead link, but this is the exact title of a section in "Think like a Freak" by Levvit and Dubner.
- projectramo 10y agoSo the best thing we can do to prevent scammers is to respond to their scams, engage them for long periods and use up their attention and time? It will only require a little time from each of us, but it will add up to a lot of time for the scammers.
- city41 10y agoThere are groups that do this. Although their goal is usually to humiliate the scammer.
- zeven7 10y agoLink?
- andrewpi 10y agohttp://www.419eater.com/ http://www.419eater.com/
- damian2000 10y agoIts hilarious that they got the scammers to hold up the hand written titles of each section of their website ... Letters page: http://www.419eater.com/html/letters.htm http://www.419eater.com/html/letters.htm Hall of shame: http://www.419eater.com/html/hall_of_shame.htm http://www.419eater.com/html/hall_of_shame.htm Trophy room: http://forum.419eater.com/forum/album.php http://forum.419eater.com/forum/album.php
- andyjohnson0 10y agoUsually referred to as "scam baiting".
- projectramo 10y agoGroups? I did hear that TED talk but I didn't realize it was an ongoing effort.
- 10y ago
- wp1 10y agoTo qualify their leads
- leonardinius 10y agoPrevious HN discussions (I omitted one without comments) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8224059 - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6673003 Source https://hn.algolia.com/?query=Why%20Do%20Nigerian%20Scammers%20Say%20They%20Are%20from%20Nigeria%3F&sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=story&storyText=false&prefix&page=0 https://hn.algolia.com/?query=Why%20Do%20Nigerian%20Scammers... (`past` link) Update: formatting
- kentosi 10y agoFor anyone else getting "Site maintenance in progress" here is Google's cached version: http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:toQgd2kX89oJ:research.microsoft.com/apps/pubs/%3Fid%3D167719+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:toQgd2k...
- pcora 10y agoseriously guys! you took research.microsoft down! :(
- tremon 10y agoProbably hosted on Azure 2.0
- mrspeaker 10y agoI had a friend who had a side-gig designing all the packaging for the products for a giant (billion dollar) dollar store. He did it because it paid extremely well, but it frustrated him so much as a designer because every time he'd do something that looked good it would get rejected - he had to intentionally make stuff look cheap and crappy!
- toss1 10y agoHa! Yes, I knew someone whose mom had very good taste (e.g., owned a small art gallery), and often traveled internationally with her husband who had many overseas posts. A large department store hired her on a freelance basis to do buying in Japan and Korea, where she'd scout products and diligently send in reports. Some years later, she somehow found out that they were using her as a reverse buyer -- since she had upper-crust taste, her reports were used as a guide about what NOT do buy for their stores. Kinda sad to see how vendors that should be selecting and creating good stuff are instead actually deliberately selecting & creating crap to market to us.
- Grishnakh 10y agoWell they do it because people buy more that way. If people didn't buy the crap, these vendors wouldn't sell it.
- erichocean 10y ago> Some years later, she somehow found out that they were using her as a reverse buyer -- since she had upper-crust taste, her reports were used as a guide about what NOT do buy for their stores. That's genius.
- gist 10y ago> he had to intentionally make stuff look cheap and crappy Same goes for store brands (say Whole Foods) always bare bones design intentionally not to look to slick.
- scandox 10y agoThis scam is very old. My father described a version of it to me when I was 12. In the early 1960s he knew a widow in Germany and she got a letter explaining about her husband's account in Nigeria. Her husband was a former oil exec and she obviously found it convincing. The key to their scheme then was to get her to come to Nigeria where they would arrange a little drama to get her past customs so she wouldn't have to declare coming back out. Once she was in illegally they just extorted her by threatening her with jail. So in this case there are clear reasons 1. They'd ultimately like to get the mark on site as it were 2. Everybody thinks Nigeria is corrupt so they believe dirty money will exist there in large quantities 3. Colonial contempt for Africans traditionally makes older people of a certain attitude susceptible to the idea that they are dealing with less savvy people than themselves.
- scoot 10y agoIt's much older than that - it dates from the 16th century [1]. I have an original example from the late 19th C. that was sent to one of my ancestors, so I did some investigating when it came to light. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_Prisoner https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_Prisoner
- chimeracoder 10y ago> I have an original example from the late 19th C. that was sent to one of my ancestors, so I did some investigating when it came to light. Wow, I'd be fascinated to see that.
- adammunich 10y agoSame
- mathattack 10y agoWow! That's a keepsake. :-)
- scoot 10y agoI scanned it and transcribed it and shared it online a few years ago, but not sure if that is still around, and I'd have to dig through boxes in the loft to find the original, however, the letter this article [1] describes sounds almost identical in content to the one I have. It reminded me that I also have a "letter from the prison chaplain", and a short follow-up letter from "Antonia Garcia" in shaky writing that trails off mid-sentence, and another letter from the "chaplain" saying he had passed, enclosing a supposed prison death certificate. [1] http://theappendix.net/issues/2013/10/proto-spam-spanish-prisoners-and-confidence-games http://theappendix.net/issues/2013/10/proto-spam-spanish-pri... EDIT: I found the transcript and have put a copy online here: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1dsb_Ss9dIRa8NvoAZ0W2FLi0cxcH_2bL127DNcYOmOM/edit?usp=sharing https://docs.google.com/document/d/1dsb_Ss9dIRa8NvoAZ0W2FLi0...
- jrs235 10y agoIf you respond to someone claiming to be from Nigeria then you are probably COMPLETELY unaware of the scam(s) related to Nigeria and therefore you are an ideal target and victim. By mentioning they are from Nigeria, they quickly filter out the informed and skeptical. This reduces them wasting their time since the person responding is likely to be ignorant or naive regardless of the reason for being such (unintelligent, mentally ill, old, isolated, or desperate).
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- sopooneo 10y agoIf this is all true, then why would we think that scammers who say they are from Nigeria actually are?
- ajuc 10y agoWe do?
- xufi 10y agoIts funny you ask that but I've watched and read a few articles of Nigerian scammers actually operating out of a country called Benin which is next door to Nigeria itself and another country (which I forget the name of). Anyways, from what I've read its basically the idea of trying not to implicate themselves and moving to a country that is known much much lesser to a scale
- shubhamjain 10y agoFunny thing is I am one of those who actually fell for it when I was silly kid who had just started using the Internet in 8th grade. Of course, I didn't have a penny to pay but it felt like I am missing out on a great opportunity. :)
- osazuwa 10y agoI heard there is this weird statistical phenomenon where as the scammer, you actually benefit from the email message being a little bit dumb. If it were actually a plausible message without typos and obvious red flags, you'd catch many more skeptical individuals in your pipeline. You spend time trying to get these people to send money, but eventually they inevitably realize it is a scam, and your time is wasted. Extremely gullible people however, won't be deterred by typos and red flags. Therefore, typos and red flags filter out skeptical individuals, enriching your pipeline.
- tcpekin 10y agoThat is exactly what the link/paper says, "By sending an email that repels all but the most gullible the scammer gets the most promising marks to self-select, and tilts the true to false positive ratio in his favor."
- notahacker 10y agoThere's a element of truth to the idea that really glaringly obvious opening emails act as a filter for the most naive, but I suspect much of it is also because scammers tend to be lazy, prefer to write about places and companies they know about, copy other scammers' "formats" slavishly, aren't necessarily aware that what sounds like a perfectly regular name to them tags them as Nigerian to most readers whether they mention it or not, and are pretty sloppy in their execution even if they start out pretending to actually be Blackberry Lottery, London Mayfair. One big reason not to mention Nigeria, oil money or large inheritances in the opening email is that even really unworldly people have spam filters. It's amazing how often even the relatively competently- executed scam listings that appear place on classified and auction sites raises red flags up because the reply email for Mrs Smith from Scotland detailing exactly how she'd like to be paid a deposit by trusted payment service PayPal belongs to princeadebayo or mrsolatunde. Still suspect they're more likely to make money doing that than the ones who have to really, really cajole the rare credulous person that replies to them to make that "deposit" for the 713,000,000 dollars of inheritance money. Worth noting the fact that Nigerians are also associated with more non-obvious forms of online fraud is almost certainly damaging for those of Nigerian heritage who actually are trying to conduct a bit of business or sell off unwanted assets online.
- writeslowly 10y agoI've wondered if this creates an unintentional selection process, even if the scammers aren't aware of how it works. Like, if the linked paper is correct, then the most successful scamming strategies involving Nigerian princes etc. propagate among the Nigerian scamming community (even if they were originally created by a complete moron), while the people painstakingly crafting believable scam emails end up with worse results and either leave the scamming trade or adopt the email format of a more successful acquaintance.
- lb1lf 10y agoI have worked in Nigeria on occasion, seeing as my employer has a presence just about anywhere hydrocarbons can conceivably be coerced from the ground. Several of the local companies I worked with had front companies in other countries to avoid being dismissed as scammers off-hand - even by fellow Nigerian enterprises... My local agent once lamented that "The world mistreats us Nigerians; it is such a shame that 99% bad apples give all Nigerians a bad name..." :-)
- deckar01 10y ago> By sending an email that repels all but the most gullible the scammer gets the most promising marks to self-select This is why I string scammers along as far as possible. I can't stop them, but I can slow them down.
- jloughry 10y agoIn the early 1990s I got a paper letter from a Nigerian scammer. It came in an airmail envelope addressed by hand—almost completely illegibly—to my work address. (Seriously impressed by the Post Office's diligence in parsing that mess and delivering it.) The letter was an nth generation photocopy, the text the familiar appeal. But they used to send them out on paper.
- jessedhillon 10y agoNon-mobile link, which is more legible on a wider display: http://research.microsoft.com/apps/pubs/?id=167719 http://research.microsoft.com/apps/pubs/?id=167719
- kazinator 10y agoSilly Microsoft. Nigerian Scammers say they are from Nigeria because that's what makes then "Nigerian Scammers". Scammers who say they are from Cameroon or Botswana are "Cameroonian Scammers" and "Botswanian Scammers", respectively and not, "Nigerian Scammers". We might ask why Nigeria is a popular choice among scammers, as the country to which to claim a connection or origin. But that is a different question. The article seems to be trying to answer that question, but mostly fails. Yes, the point is well understood that scammers have to pitch their proposal in such a way that only the gullible will bite, who are likely to follow through. However, it doesn't answer, "why specifically Nigeria?" Because to someone of reasonable intellect, a scam letter claiming connections to Cameroon is just as "comical" as one claiming connections to Nigeria. Let me offer a hypothesis. The choice of Nigeria may simply be some sort of unquestioned tradition among scammers. Perhaps it like the proverbial "onion in the varnish" (written about by our dearly beloved Paul Graham himself: http://paulgraham.com/arcll1.html http://paulgraham.com/arcll1.html). Maybe scammers learn scamming from other scammers via some hand-me-down "Scamming HOWTO" documents, and those documents claim that using Nigeria works (so just use it and don't question it). If the scammer newbies tried Cameroon instead, they might find that it also works just as well, but they don't; they stick with the shibboleth of using the "tried and true" Nigeria. Perhaps at some time in history, the name Nigeria did actually invoke images of financial corruption and could specifically appeal to some gullible person's sense of greed. (Just like the onion in the varnish did once help to identify temperature by how fast it caramelizes.) Today, Nigeria isn't any sort of "poster country" for corruption in the popular imagination. Interestingly, Nigeria is even used in scams that don't have to do with financial corruption. Years ago, some woman claiming to be from Nigeria sent me links to her profile: a dating scam! Just for fun, I started to send "her" some conversations, discussing all sorts of Nigerian matters that I could google up: current events in Nigeria and such. Then the story turned that "she" is actually in Portland Oregon, but originally from Nigeria. LOL ... Basically, scammers seem to be quite stupidly clinging to some formula involving Nigeria, which they possibly pick up from their predecessors, and are even naively applying it in irrelevant ways which have nothing to do with any connection between Nigeria and corruption.
- vegabook 10y agoUmmm... because Westerners' prior beliefs about endemic corruption in Nigeria is a given, which is what the scams are usually asking you to facilitate.
- sl8r 10y agoCf. The Dark Lord of the Internet [1] and the relevant HN discussion [2], which give an interesting peek into the psychology of internet scams. [1] http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2014/01/the-dark-lord-of-the-internet/355726/ http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2014/01/the-dark... [2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6972139 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6972139
- oferzelig 10y agoWhy is a 2012 article published on Hacker News today?
- eru 10y agoPeople submit all kinds of articles to the 'new' section all the time. Some of them get upvoted to the front page.
- sengork 10y agoI find it quite interesting that nobody has yet mentioned "The 3rd Annual Nigerian EMail Conference" http://web.archive.org/web/20120127023739/http://j-walk.com/other/conf/index.htm http://web.archive.org/web/20120127023739/http://j-walk.com/... http://www.stearns.org/fun/nigerian-email-conference.htm http://www.stearns.org/fun/nigerian-email-conference.htm An oldie but goodie.
- aj7 10y agoExact strategy of Republicans, but differing statistics. Form a polarizing ideology of economic claptrap and a combination of phony religiousty and racism. Hone polarizing features. Find it suckers about 35% of the population. Much higher hit rate than the Nigerian scam but same principle. The 35% is a big problem. So combine it with a tax structure that favors any non-employee and high wage employees. Hope for a majority,
- mmwako 10y agoI reckon then that the best way to help people avoid these scammers, is to actually answer their emails, therefore making the scammer go through tons of false positives... interesting.
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