Is This a Scam to Get Money?

There’s always the very faint possibility that this is legitimate – but that possibility is around 0.01%, to be honest. What you almost certainly have is a slight variation on what’s known as the Nigerian advance-fee fraud. It’s also often just called 419 – its number on the Nigerian criminal statute. But whether from Nigeria, Ghana, or anywhere else, it amounts to much the same thing.

It’s one of the classic scams. Like many others you might have received an e-mail from someone in a bank or in government somewhere in Africa, claiming they have access to funds, often in the high thousands or millions, but they need to transfer it to another country.

They’ve contacted you (as well as several million others, although of course they don’t say that) in the hope you can help by letting them use your bank account. In return for that they promise you a percentage of the amount, a very tempting figure.

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What they need from you, in order to get everything moving, is a certain amount of cash to grease palms. However, if you send it, you’ll find soon that they’ll say they need more, and then more and more. They’ll happily drain your bank account and you’ll end up never seeing a penny in return. There have also been instances where people have been asked to bring money to Nigeria, or wherever. Once there you money quickly disappears – there have even been reports of people being beaten and robbed.

In spite of it being one of the best-known and most publicised of the scams, people continue to fall for it. Very few end up being prosecuted for perpetrating it, either, tending to work from the anonymity of Internet cafes. A few people have certainly got rich from it. Several variations of this idea have sprung up.

Although it might be tempting – and like most scams, it appeals to the greed in us all – it’s generally easily spotted. Why would someone from another country choose you over the Internet. In your case the relationship seems more personal, but that doesn’t mean you can trust it. The safest thing to do is steer very clear.

Your situation may be slightly different. ask a question below ↓ and our editorial team will reply with our advice.

The Next Step

Now that you have read through the advice above, you might want to put it into practice. Our Scam Detector lets you got a text, call, email or offer that feels off? Paste it in below and we will tell you how scammy it looks, the warning signs to spot, and exactly what to do next. Try it now →