Anyone with an email account will at some stage have received a scam email. You know the kind of thing – ‘I work at a bank where a chap has died leaving 50 million US in cash and I need your help’ or ‘you have won the lottery yada, yada , yada’. These letters are known as 419 scams or Advance Fee Fraud’. Most people just delete them but some unfortunate and misguided souls fall for these offers and end up losing lots of money, their jobs, family and even their lives.
The scammers however have met their match. I recently happened across a whole community of internet users dedicated to combating these fraudsters and engaging in the highly amusing sport of scambaiting. The baiter use the greed of the scammers against them often resulting in hilarious results. One expert baiter (I deliberately refrain from using the term master!) has succeeded in actually getting scammers to send him money as well as persuading others to handwriting out an entire Harry Potter book, drawing A-Z maps by hand, carving a perfect replica of a Commodore 664 keyboard and even persuading one scammer to get a tattoo!
You can find out more about scambaiting and read many of the stories on www.419eater.com – hours of entertainment at the expense of criminals!
