wired.com — They pilfer nearly $200 million from Americans annually and drive some of their victims to suicide, but Nigeria's notorious e-mail scam artists may finally have met their match -- and the results can be hilarious.
Aug 4, 2006 View in Crawl 4
switch22Aug 4, 2006
I've got to get started on this right away
nuhausAug 5, 2006
"Why do scambaiters pretend (or worse, actually believe) their jokes are actually helping the problem?"Scambaiting obviously takes a scammer's time and energy away from trying to dupe an unsuspecting victim. The more people know about these scams the less likely they'll be fooled.
oaksiderAug 5, 2006
These are truely some of the most interesting reads on the net, add to that the 'good guys' kicking ass and [quite easily] outsmarting these scamming fools. Beautiful. +dugg. Classic.
Closed AccountAug 6, 2006
OK, I automatically downvote anything that links to "Wired". If I want "Wired"'s level of journalistic integrity, I'll go to the quickie mart and pick up a copy of Weekly World News. Bonus bad taste points for mentioning "suicide" and "hilarious" in the same sentence. Besides, spam/scammer-baiting has kind of like, uh, BEEN DONE. Like in the year 1995.
Closed AccountAug 6, 2006
By the way, I don't get it. I have never read a scammer-baiting story that was the least bit amusing. They're boring as hell. Even a brief description of the techniques is boring as hell.This is nothing but "MTV's Jackass" or perhaps "BumFights" in slow motion.
murphysAug 6, 2006
I don't know about the scammers, but I know I'VE wasted an entire day reading the stories. Best entertainment I've had in months.
cyberdactylAug 6, 2006
Hehe, dude, admitting you're a low income loser who can't hold on to cash past $1000 surely isn't something I'd readily admit to the world.
Closed AccountAug 8, 2006
"Hehe, dude, admitting you're a low income loser who can't hold on to cash past $1000 surely isn't something I'd readily admit to the world."Well, then, maybe that says something about you? Subtract DEBT from your personal balance; average US citizen hardly tastes $1000 (above the balance of their debt and tax burden!) all at once at any moment in their lifetimes. This is most of a decade experience in the banking industry talking here. The average citizen is born in, lives in, and even dies in debt. Student loan, home mortgage, car payments, owed taxes, credit cards. That job you work at is just to pay the cost of keeping you as a slave. Those "savings" you deposit to earn a crummy 2% interest do nothing to offset the 25% interest you're paying on your cards. In fact, much of percieved wealth of even those well-to-do is on paper only.