Yep, I already know this is a scam, but it's not me that is being scammed but my friend's mother. So far, this is what I know:
* The scammer contacted her on match.com although she did not have a picture or any profile info (besides gender, age and name).
* He claims to be a General stationed in Afghanistan.
* He says he wants to come to Norway to marry her.
* He should've come to Norway twice the past 5 weeks, but something has stopped him every time. I am unsure wether or not she has sent him money for the flight ticket.
* They have tried skyping, but every time his camera fails, so they end up chatting instead (via skype).
* He wants her to invest several million NOK ( a total of 600K USD or so) in some sort of secret project. Something to do with automisation of agriculture. She won't tell her own daughter more about it, cause it's very hush-hush
* He also requested that she send him an iPhone. Not sure if she has done this yet.
* She has the money. She's good for it, and is ready to send it. Anyone who questions the legitimacy of this scam is getting yelled at. She just now (15 mins ago) threatened never to speak to her own daughter again.
Of course this is a scam, but what do we do? How do we prevent her from screwing herself over? We even contacted the lokal economics crime dept. and they immidiately set up an appointment to try and convince her it is a scam, but I doubt she will turn up.
So I am looking at other options.
a) Does anyone know of a documented scam where the same name has been used, or 10 scams that are so similar if presented together they might convince her?
b) Is it possible to track the IP of a skype chat to see if he's really where he claims to be? (and what do we say when he claims his IP is redirected cause he's military)
c) Any other options? Get him to send a picture, then find out who is really on that picture?
Thanks for any help in advance.
I should probably get more info, like what name he uses on his match profile (which apparently is deleted now), his skype-nick etc, but she is really aggresive and secretive about stuff. Will try and figure out more every hour, but I fear we're short on time here.
* The scammer contacted her on match.com although she did not have a picture or any profile info (besides gender, age and name).
* He claims to be a General stationed in Afghanistan.
* He says he wants to come to Norway to marry her.
* He should've come to Norway twice the past 5 weeks, but something has stopped him every time. I am unsure wether or not she has sent him money for the flight ticket.
* They have tried skyping, but every time his camera fails, so they end up chatting instead (via skype).
* He wants her to invest several million NOK ( a total of 600K USD or so) in some sort of secret project. Something to do with automisation of agriculture. She won't tell her own daughter more about it, cause it's very hush-hush
* He also requested that she send him an iPhone. Not sure if she has done this yet.
* She has the money. She's good for it, and is ready to send it. Anyone who questions the legitimacy of this scam is getting yelled at. She just now (15 mins ago) threatened never to speak to her own daughter again.
Of course this is a scam, but what do we do? How do we prevent her from screwing herself over? We even contacted the lokal economics crime dept. and they immidiately set up an appointment to try and convince her it is a scam, but I doubt she will turn up.
So I am looking at other options.
a) Does anyone know of a documented scam where the same name has been used, or 10 scams that are so similar if presented together they might convince her?
b) Is it possible to track the IP of a skype chat to see if he's really where he claims to be? (and what do we say when he claims his IP is redirected cause he's military)
c) Any other options? Get him to send a picture, then find out who is really on that picture?
Thanks for any help in advance.
I should probably get more info, like what name he uses on his match profile (which apparently is deleted now), his skype-nick etc, but she is really aggresive and secretive about stuff. Will try and figure out more every hour, but I fear we're short on time here.
