Need opinion

Is anyone aware of a change in tactics which involves registering on forums to get at the member list database and use the PM function to send out the bait message. i need to know ASAP if anyone has any info>

Hi Miki, welcome to scamwarners.

The simple answer is yes they do.

Even our sister site 419eater which deals with baiting scammers gets the odd visitor trying to find victims to scam, when they arrive we are always right on it and usually get to play with them

If you have recieved a mesage you could post it here for us to do some searches but if you have been contacted by a new member on a forum out of the blue it is most likely a scammer, contact the site administraytors and let them know as they have most likely tried the same thing with other members as well, some may not be as astute as you were

I am a moderator of a beekeeping site and happen to be a cop. Thanks for confirming the tactic and maybe I can help you out. The idiot registers on the forum and then registers a second member from the same IP with the user name "Marc" to let other shitheads know the site is being used.

Glad I could help, we often seek the help of police when we find vics who do not believe our warnings so who knows, you may just be a huge help to us in the future.

It is probably a good idea to put up a post to warn your other members that it has occured, you could also ban the IP, (presumably from one of the scammer hotspots) which will keep that scammer and most of his internet friends form using the Forum, I dont mean to sound rude but do you know how to look for information on IP addresses to find the location of the poster, it is often a good way to see if your new members are legitimate, a new member saying he is from the US with an African IP will always (sorry, I should be politically correct almost always) be a scammer

Actually I do not know how to do that but the owner of the site does he is a IMO for a UK corporation. He should be taking the action you reccomended as we speak and Thanks for your help!

Here is the link to the thread it is the initial contact with the forum and appears to have been cut and pasted into the message pane.

Also the way she speaks is not indicative of a beekeeper.

Many red flags!!!!

I have to say looking at the posts there is no proof that it is a scammer, in saying that instinct tells me it is, a Bee Keeper from Nigeria would have difficulty in keeping up with the latest terminology and there is no lie about the location I would presume.

Keep a close eye and insist on those photos of the hives, ask what type of bees they keep and ask about yields, I know little about bees myself, I got stung a few times as a kid and soon discovered I dont like bees but I do like honey which is why I tolerate them

If the questions cant be answered or the photos not supplied then ban away, there is a slight chance that it is genuine in which case you may just expand your knowledge on Nigerian bees.

The other thing I suggest is to remove the link to that post from this site, it does lead to a fair bit of your own personnal details which I take it you dont care about so much as you deal with criminals every day anyway but still we do prefer our visitors to remain safe, the choice is yours

Will do thanks for looking!

I have just received an email to contact the award department of [email protected] from a certain maria c. albano, which I have found out to be unrelated. Please advice

Hi Manangpa and welcome to Scamwarners,

I have just replied to your PM not realising you had also posted.

I will paste my response in here for others to see as well

And here it is (with a few typos fixed and linked the search result)

I have done a search on the email address you gave me and found these search results Click Here I cant look into them further from the computer I am currently on as the first site is blocked from this computer and the 419eater hits have been deleted for some reason.

It is hard to be 100% sure without seeing the actual email you received but if you have been told about contacting the rewards department then it would most likely be a lottery scam.

If you would like to forward (or post) me the initial email then I can do some more searching for you but from what I can see there is no doubt it is a scam.

The forum here has a section on lottery scams which will give you a good idea on how that work but to put it in a nutshell, you will be required to pay them fees for all kinds of things so the money can be sent to you, of course, no money will ever actually be sent to you, the idea is that you send them money and continue sending money until such time as you realise that no money will be coming your way, it is at that time that you will recieve another email from the same person using a different email address, they may say that they are a law enforcement body and they can retrieve your money for you, problem is that the ywill require fees in order to return you money and so the scam begins again.

A I said, forward me the initial email you recieved and I will be able to give you more details but rest assured that you have not actually won a lottery

Welcome Miki. Just wanted to say hi. I used to be a beekeeper myself. I started when I was 8 years old and kept bees until I graduated high school. Had about 27 hives at one time. If the guy isn't knowledgeable about bees it should be easy to trip him up. I'd ask about different strains of bees and common pests like the Varroa mites. A non-beekeeper wouldn't have a clue as to what those are.