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Beware of scams!

Written by Cherelle Jackson
Sunday, 20 July 2008
About $1.5 billion would have been mine for the taking two days ago, that is, if I was totally deluded and ignorant of scam artists. Fact is, anyone who an e-mail account, a mailing address, a fax or phone is prone to scams. They come in different forms and different shapes and types, but the goal is generally the same, to rob you of funds, to gain from you in one way or another, to mislead you while tricking you at the same time. They do this under the guise of your good fortune, they make you believe that you will be way richer than you are now, if you give them your bank account number, if you send them a few thousand bucks, if you do this and that, which more often than not, requires you to reveal a bit, to give a bit, in a false bid to get back more than you gave. It’s best to take the ‘nothing is for free in life’ approach when faced with such scammers. Nigeria It all started from Nigeria, at least the most severest of them all. According to published reports on scam artists the a US$5billion worldwide scam has run since the early 1980's under Successive Governments of Nigeria. It is also referred to as "Advance Fee Fraud", "419 Fraud” after a formerly relevant section of the Criminal Code of Nigeria, and "The Nigerian Connection". However, it is usually called plain old "419" even by the Nigerians themselves. In brief, 419 is a sub-classification of Advance Fee Fraud crime in which the perpetrators are West Africans, primarily Nigerians, operating globally from Nigeria and elsewhere. The Scam operates as follows: the target receives an unsolicited fax, email, or letter often concerning Nigeria or another African nation containing either a money laundering or other illegal proposal OR you may receive a Legal and Legitimate business proposal by normal means. Common variations on the Scam include "overinvoiced" or "double invoiced" oil or other supply and service contracts where your Bad Guys want to get the overage out of Nigeria , crude oil and other commodity deals, a "bequest" left you in a will, "money cleaning" where your Bad Guy has a lot of currency that needs to be "chemically cleaned" before it can be used and he needs the cost of the chemicals. "Spoof banks" where there is supposedly money in your name already on deposit; "paying" for a purchase with a check larger than the amount required and asking for change to be advanced (cashier's check and money order 419); fake lottery 419; chat room and romance 419, employment 419 which requires ordering items and commodities off "trading" and "auction" sites on the web and then cheating the seller. According to ‘ScamBusters’ the variations of Advance Fee Fraud are very creative and virtually endless, so do not consider the above as an all-inclusive list! Samoa There have been no official records as to the number of scams which reach our shores and what types. There has been no official count of such scams, however it is common to see mail fraud and email frauds in Samoa. The Central Bank of Samoa however in a recent statement said they are weary of such acts and therefore have established regulations accordingly. CBS says that regulation of the offshore finance sector, with the passage in April 2008 of the International Companies Amendment Bill, has been further strengthened. According to them this Act promotes corporate transparency by immobilizing bearer shares, to ensure that shareholders of international companies are not anonymous, and requires the register of members or copy there to be kept at the company’s registered office. But in trying to achieve this CBS says that it is fair to say that no jurisdiction in the world (offering international business corporations) readily provides names of beneficial owners to law enforcement agencies without just cause. CBS says a notable amendment to the companies legislation is the extended gateway for information sharing which allows the Registrar of International and Foreign Companies to provide information to a domestic or foreign agency responsible for the prevention and suppression of terrorism and money laundering. According to Papali’i there is also leeway for disclosure of information by the Registrar or the Minister of Finance to any other person, in what he believes are in the best interests of Samoa and to uphold the integrity of our jurisdiction as a reputable offshore financial centre. Cheers! Comments (0) Subscribe to this comment's feed Write comment Name Email Title Comment
Last Updated ( Thursday, 24 July 2008 )

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