Scam Alert!

Pic courtesy of Uncle Scam

A while ago, I received an email from a certain Edwin from Cote D’Ivoire. Apparently, he was saying that he comes from a rich and influential family with a distinguished political background.

He moves on to state that his father was killed by the rebels in his country which is currently ravaged in a civil war. He offered me a cut of his fortune worth millions (15%) if I were to help him move his assets out from his country to a safe haven. Wow. How very generous!

Just reading his email makes me want to laugh. Several points in his mail really got my alarm bell ringing.

1. Coming from a ‘distinguished’ background, his command of the English language sure is atrocious.

2. The email was addressed to a nick which I used in an Internet Marketing forum which I frequent. So obviously this guy must have gone around harvesting emails and mass sending everyone, and then waiting for people who bother to respond.

3. The whole thing was very vaguely described. He gave little information about himself. His style of writing is also very incoherent. Hardly did anything to inspire any trust in me.

4. Considering that he just knew me, he certainly was over eager in asking me for my help, without finding out more about me in detail.

5. Most damning of all, in his follow up email, he got the cheek to ask me for some money to kickstart some transferring process. Now that is utterly ludicrous.

Needless to say, I ignored him.

He obviously thinks I’m some kid who is easy to con. Well he thought wrong!

Seriously, such scams have been going on for some time. I’m sure some of you guys may have came across such mails at some point in time. Many of them are Nigerian or African in origin, all singing the same tune.

I find it hard to believe that some people actually fall for such scams! Clearly, when it comes to quick get rick cash, many people get all itchy, eager to taste some easy money. More like funny money! Greed can really blind even the most level headed of people.

Victims of such scams usually end up losing money, and in extreme cases, even their lives! Goes to show how some of these scam artists can be downright ruthless.

Bottom line is, there is no such thing as getting money that requires little or no effort!

In life, there is really no place for quick get rich methods. To achieve success, we must devote substantial groundwork effort to build up a good base and then expanding on it. If anyone ever promises fast riches to you in future, do yourself a favour. Ask him to go fly kite!

43 Things tags: Scam, business, quick get rich

yes you were right. I experienced that way too especially in emails. And oh boy,so tiresome to delete spam emails. We should not be fooled by them. Prove to the scammers that only small brains do such acts.