WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:03.419 I want you to picture probably the most famous 00:00:03.419 --> 00:00:05.519 email in the history of the internet. You know 00:00:05.519 --> 00:00:07.299 the one? Oh, absolutely. The subject line is 00:00:07.299 --> 00:00:10.000 always in all caps, right? Right. It's like a 00:00:10.000 --> 00:00:12.519 urgent business proposal. Right. Or maybe it 00:00:12.519 --> 00:00:15.119 starts with Dear Beloved or Respected Sir. And 00:00:15.119 --> 00:00:18.589 it is almost always from a prince. Or a barrister. 00:00:18.829 --> 00:00:21.210 Or the weeping widow of some deposed general. 00:00:21.329 --> 00:00:23.550 Yeah, and they always have the exact same problem. 00:00:23.670 --> 00:00:26.769 They are sitting on this massive fortune, millions 00:00:26.769 --> 00:00:29.750 of dollars, gold bullion, maybe blood diamonds, 00:00:30.250 --> 00:00:32.770 but it is locked in a vault somewhere. Exactly. 00:00:33.109 --> 00:00:35.729 And they need you, just some total stranger on 00:00:35.729 --> 00:00:37.609 the internet, to help them get it out. Right, 00:00:37.710 --> 00:00:40.390 which is just, on its face, ridiculous. It is 00:00:40.390 --> 00:00:43.479 the oldest punchline on the web. I mean, we screenshot 00:00:43.479 --> 00:00:45.700 these things, we turn them into memes, we forward 00:00:45.700 --> 00:00:47.880 them to our friends just to have a laugh at the 00:00:47.880 --> 00:00:50.299 terrible grammar. We do. But that's the thing. 00:00:50.579 --> 00:00:52.280 But here's the cold reality check that we are 00:00:52.280 --> 00:00:55.060 going to unpack today in this deep dive. While 00:00:55.060 --> 00:00:58.439 we are all laughing at these emails, people are 00:00:58.439 --> 00:01:01.179 losing everything. And I don't just mean their 00:01:01.179 --> 00:01:04.620 life savings. I mean their actual lives. It is 00:01:04.620 --> 00:01:08.400 a massive global industry. And honestly, just 00:01:08.400 --> 00:01:11.780 calling it the Nigerian Prince scam, it kind 00:01:11.780 --> 00:01:14.200 of minimizes it. It makes it sound like a cartoon 00:01:14.200 --> 00:01:16.840 villain. It really does. So what is the actual 00:01:16.840 --> 00:01:19.700 term for it? The formal term in the fraud world 00:01:19.700 --> 00:01:23.299 is an advance fee scam or advance fee fraud. 00:01:23.519 --> 00:01:25.620 And when you really look under the hood of how 00:01:25.620 --> 00:01:28.819 this works, it is a terrifyingly sophisticated 00:01:28.819 --> 00:01:31.980 psychological machine. So that is our mission 00:01:31.980 --> 00:01:34.799 for this deep dive. We are going to stop treating 00:01:34.799 --> 00:01:37.340 this topic like a joke. We have pulled together 00:01:37.340 --> 00:01:39.739 research, case studies, and historical records, 00:01:39.959 --> 00:01:42.140 and we are going to look at the history, which 00:01:42.140 --> 00:01:44.140 goes back way further than the internet, by the 00:01:44.140 --> 00:01:45.859 way. Way further. We're going to look at the 00:01:45.859 --> 00:01:48.079 psychology of why we actually fall for it and 00:01:48.079 --> 00:01:50.299 the genuinely dark reality of what happens when 00:01:50.299 --> 00:01:52.739 the victim's money finally runs out. And I think 00:01:52.739 --> 00:01:54.379 we should start by just breaking down that core 00:01:54.379 --> 00:01:56.719 mechanism because it is deceptively simple. The 00:01:56.719 --> 00:01:58.920 name advance fee describes it perfectly. Right. 00:01:58.920 --> 00:02:01.599 So how does the hook actually work? Well, the 00:02:01.599 --> 00:02:04.439 victim has promised this massive reward. It could 00:02:04.439 --> 00:02:07.480 be an inheritance, lottery winnings, a lucrative 00:02:07.480 --> 00:02:10.020 government contract. But to get it, they just 00:02:10.020 --> 00:02:12.680 have to pay a small fee up front. The classic 00:02:12.680 --> 00:02:15.080 send me five thousand dollars for legal fees 00:02:15.080 --> 00:02:17.400 and I will release the five million to your bank 00:02:17.400 --> 00:02:19.939 account. Exactly. But the catch is once you pay 00:02:19.939 --> 00:02:22.650 that first five thousand. The finish line suddenly 00:02:22.650 --> 00:02:24.650 moves. There's always a new problem. Always. 00:02:24.969 --> 00:02:27.849 Now there is a surprise tax or now there is a 00:02:27.849 --> 00:02:30.669 bribe you have to pay to a stubborn bank manager. 00:02:30.789 --> 00:02:33.069 Now there's a foreign transfer fee. It becomes 00:02:33.069 --> 00:02:35.949 this infinite loop of payments that really only 00:02:35.949 --> 00:02:38.389 ends when the victim is either totally bankrupt 00:02:38.389 --> 00:02:40.669 or they finally snap out of it and realize it's 00:02:40.669 --> 00:02:43.150 a lie. Now I have always heard this specific 00:02:43.150 --> 00:02:46.750 type of fraud referred to as a 419 scam. Is that 00:02:46.750 --> 00:02:49.310 just like Law enforcement slang? It's actually 00:02:49.310 --> 00:02:52.870 a specific legal citation. Section 419 of the 00:02:52.870 --> 00:02:55.110 Nigerian Criminal Code is the part that deals 00:02:55.110 --> 00:02:57.610 with fraud. So in the cybersecurity industry, 00:02:57.949 --> 00:03:00.490 these operators are often just called 419ers. 00:03:00.590 --> 00:03:02.949 Oh, OK. But if you go to Lagos, the local slang 00:03:02.949 --> 00:03:04.550 on the street is completely different. They call 00:03:04.550 --> 00:03:07.750 it Yahoo, Yahoo. Yahoo, Yahoo. Wait, like the 00:03:07.750 --> 00:03:10.110 search engine? The very same. It is literally 00:03:10.110 --> 00:03:12.800 a fossil from the early days of the web. It's 00:03:12.800 --> 00:03:16.680 wild. Yeah, back in the late 90s and early 2000s, 00:03:16.819 --> 00:03:20.560 Yahoo Mail was the free platform of choice. So 00:03:20.560 --> 00:03:22.979 the guys sitting in the cyber cafes sending out 00:03:22.979 --> 00:03:25.520 these massive email blasts just became known 00:03:25.520 --> 00:03:28.000 as Yahoo Boys. It's fascinating that there's 00:03:28.000 --> 00:03:30.060 a whole subculture built around this, because 00:03:30.060 --> 00:03:32.379 I remember reading in our sources that back in 00:03:32.379 --> 00:03:35.580 the 80s, Nigeria had this perfect storm economically. 00:03:35.819 --> 00:03:38.039 That did it. There was an oil crash, the economy 00:03:38.039 --> 00:03:40.439 just completely tanked. And suddenly you had 00:03:40.439 --> 00:03:42.680 this entire generation of university graduates 00:03:42.680 --> 00:03:45.340 with absolutely zero job prospects. That is the 00:03:45.340 --> 00:03:47.620 crucial context here. You had a highly educated, 00:03:48.080 --> 00:03:50.419 very motivated, but desperately unemployed young 00:03:50.419 --> 00:03:53.139 men. And then the internet arrived. So it became 00:03:53.139 --> 00:03:55.280 a survival strategy. Exactly. It was a way to 00:03:55.280 --> 00:03:57.300 make a living. And it even seeped into the pop 00:03:57.300 --> 00:03:59.680 culture and the music over there. There is a 00:03:59.680 --> 00:04:02.180 famous hip hop track by an artist named Nickom 00:04:02.180 --> 00:04:05.199 Owo called I Go Chop Your Dollar. I Will Eat 00:04:05.199 --> 00:04:07.580 Your Dollars. Yeah. That is not very subtle. 00:04:07.919 --> 00:04:11.379 Not at all. The lyrics literally say, 419 is 00:04:11.379 --> 00:04:13.620 just a game. I am the winner. You are the loser. 00:04:14.139 --> 00:04:17.420 It openly glamorized the lifestyle, the fast 00:04:17.420 --> 00:04:21.079 cars, the luxury living. It was framed almost 00:04:21.079 --> 00:04:24.019 as a way to get back at the wealthy Western countries. 00:04:24.240 --> 00:04:26.019 But we do need to be really careful with the 00:04:26.019 --> 00:04:28.139 geography here, right? Because we keep saying 00:04:28.139 --> 00:04:30.899 Nigeria, since that is the famous origin point 00:04:30.899 --> 00:04:33.740 and the stereotype. But our sources are very 00:04:33.740 --> 00:04:36.220 clear that this is not contained by Nigerian 00:04:36.220 --> 00:04:38.899 borders anymore. Oh, not at all. It is a completely 00:04:38.899 --> 00:04:41.920 transnational enterprise now. We see massive 00:04:41.920 --> 00:04:44.379 volumes of advanced fee fraud. originating from 00:04:44.379 --> 00:04:47.800 the Ivory Coast, Togo, South Africa, the Netherlands, 00:04:48.000 --> 00:04:50.779 Spain. It's everywhere. Yeah. And Jamaica is 00:04:50.779 --> 00:04:53.360 a huge hotbed for lottery -specific scams right 00:04:53.360 --> 00:04:55.660 now. So it's essentially a global franchise model 00:04:55.660 --> 00:04:58.019 at this point. But here is the thing that has 00:04:58.019 --> 00:04:59.899 always totally baffled me about this. And I think 00:04:59.899 --> 00:05:01.259 this is where most people listening probably 00:05:01.259 --> 00:05:03.939 get tripped up too. What's that? The quality 00:05:03.939 --> 00:05:06.139 of the emails themselves. They are just terrible. 00:05:06.319 --> 00:05:10.019 You mean visually? Visually, structurally, grammatically, 00:05:10.439 --> 00:05:12.959 logically. I mean, if I were a criminal mastermind 00:05:12.959 --> 00:05:15.720 trying to steal millions of dollars, I would 00:05:15.720 --> 00:05:17.959 at least run my pitch through a spell checker. 00:05:18.339 --> 00:05:21.199 I would hire a copywriter. Right. It feels like 00:05:21.199 --> 00:05:23.740 the overwhelming badness of the email would just 00:05:23.740 --> 00:05:26.100 scare everyone away. Right. Why haven't they 00:05:26.100 --> 00:05:28.540 improved the script over the last 20 years? This 00:05:28.540 --> 00:05:30.439 is actually one of my absolute favorite pieces 00:05:30.439 --> 00:05:32.720 of research we looked at. There is a researcher 00:05:32.720 --> 00:05:35.680 named Cormac Hurley from Microsoft Research who 00:05:35.680 --> 00:05:39.230 did a deep dive into exactly this question. And 00:05:39.230 --> 00:05:41.790 his conclusion is brilliant. What did he find? 00:05:41.990 --> 00:05:44.509 He found that the typos are not a bug. They are 00:05:44.509 --> 00:05:47.709 a feature. A feature? How on earth is looking 00:05:47.709 --> 00:05:50.449 completely incompetent a feature for a con artist? 00:05:50.670 --> 00:05:52.310 You have to think about it from the stammer's 00:05:52.310 --> 00:05:54.790 perspective. Sending out 10 million emails is 00:05:54.790 --> 00:05:58.050 cheap. It's virtually free. But actually talking 00:05:58.050 --> 00:06:01.329 to a victim... That takes a lot of time. It takes 00:06:01.329 --> 00:06:04.470 effort to groom someone, to exchange dozens of 00:06:04.470 --> 00:06:07.149 emails, to build trust, to walk them through 00:06:07.149 --> 00:06:10.230 a bank transfer. A scammer absolutely cannot 00:06:10.230 --> 00:06:13.649 afford to waste three weeks talking to a skeptic 00:06:13.649 --> 00:06:15.589 who is eventually going to spot a red flag and 00:06:15.589 --> 00:06:18.410 back out. Oh. Oh, I see where you're going with 00:06:18.410 --> 00:06:21.180 this. Yeah. It is a filter. It is a brilliant, 00:06:21.639 --> 00:06:24.800 roofless filter. By making the initial email 00:06:24.800 --> 00:06:27.639 completely ridiculous, full of bizarre spelling 00:06:27.639 --> 00:06:30.839 errors and totally implausible claims about locked 00:06:30.839 --> 00:06:33.259 vaults, they ensure that anyone with a critical 00:06:33.259 --> 00:06:36.339 eye deletes it immediately. It naturally repels 00:06:36.339 --> 00:06:39.180 the smart people. Exactly. It repels the skeptics. 00:06:39.500 --> 00:06:42.699 So if you read that email and you still hit reply, 00:06:42.779 --> 00:06:45.319 you have effectively self -selected as a viable 00:06:45.319 --> 00:06:48.259 target. Precisely. You have signaled to the scammer 00:06:48.259 --> 00:06:50.449 that you are either dusted enough, maybe elderly 00:06:50.449 --> 00:06:53.629 and confused. or just gullible enough to fall 00:06:53.629 --> 00:06:56.430 for the rest of the con. It saves the scammer 00:06:56.430 --> 00:06:58.310 huge amounts of time by weeding out the false 00:06:58.310 --> 00:07:01.269 positives. People like you or me who might reply 00:07:01.269 --> 00:07:03.810 just to mess with them, but who will never actually 00:07:03.810 --> 00:07:06.310 pay. That is just diabolically efficient. It's 00:07:06.310 --> 00:07:08.230 like an algorithm for finding vulnerability. 00:07:08.410 --> 00:07:10.209 They don't want the smartest victims. They want 00:07:10.209 --> 00:07:12.350 the most compliant ones. Correct. And they actually 00:07:12.350 --> 00:07:14.370 test that compliance again almost immediately 00:07:14.370 --> 00:07:17.170 after you reply. Very often, the first thing 00:07:17.170 --> 00:07:19.209 they ask for in the second or third email is 00:07:19.209 --> 00:07:21.449 your bank account information. See, I always 00:07:21.449 --> 00:07:23.709 assumed that was the ultimate end game. They 00:07:23.709 --> 00:07:25.350 get the routing number, they drain the checking 00:07:25.350 --> 00:07:27.930 account, and it's game over. Surprisingly, that 00:07:27.930 --> 00:07:31.310 is rarely the actual goal. Bank transfers are 00:07:31.310 --> 00:07:34.089 incredibly risky for scammers. They leave a solid 00:07:34.089 --> 00:07:36.509 paper trail. They can be reversed by the bank. 00:07:36.589 --> 00:07:38.550 And if a scammer tries to pull a large sum of 00:07:38.550 --> 00:07:41.350 money out of a random account, modern bank fraud 00:07:41.350 --> 00:07:43.810 detection usually catches it and freezes everything. 00:07:44.089 --> 00:07:47.540 So why do they ask for it so early on? It is 00:07:47.540 --> 00:07:50.779 just another psychological test. If you are willing 00:07:50.779 --> 00:07:53.560 to hand over sensitive financial info to a stranger, 00:07:53.660 --> 00:07:56.120 you are officially hooked. Once you provide it, 00:07:56.240 --> 00:07:58.079 the scammer usually pivots right away. What do 00:07:58.079 --> 00:08:00.240 they say? They'll say something like, oh, actually, 00:08:00.379 --> 00:08:03.259 my friend, we cannot use the direct bank transfer 00:08:03.259 --> 00:08:05.680 for the initial legal fee because of strict government 00:08:05.680 --> 00:08:08.519 regulations. You need to use Western Union or 00:08:08.519 --> 00:08:11.779 MoneyGram instead. Ah, right. The irreversible 00:08:11.779 --> 00:08:15.029 payment methods. Exactly. Cash on the wire. Because 00:08:15.029 --> 00:08:17.449 once you send money via Western Union to a fake 00:08:17.449 --> 00:08:21.250 ID in Lagos or Johannesburg, it is gone. It is 00:08:21.250 --> 00:08:23.269 quite literally like throwing a suitcase of cash 00:08:23.269 --> 00:08:25.170 out of a moving helicopter. You are never getting 00:08:25.170 --> 00:08:28.209 it back. So the typos filter the audience, the 00:08:28.209 --> 00:08:30.790 bank request tests their blind obedience, and 00:08:30.790 --> 00:08:32.710 then the wire transfer takes the actual cash. 00:08:33.029 --> 00:08:35.129 It's a funnel. A highly optimized sales funnel, 00:08:35.289 --> 00:08:38.230 yes. Now, you mentioned earlier that this whole 00:08:38.230 --> 00:08:40.559 mechanic predates the Internet. I know confidence 00:08:40.559 --> 00:08:42.440 tricks are old, obviously. But are we talking 00:08:42.440 --> 00:08:45.639 about the exact same script? The wealthy person 00:08:45.639 --> 00:08:47.799 trapped with a fortune. Almost word for word, 00:08:47.899 --> 00:08:50.480 the same script. If you go back to the late 18th 00:08:50.480 --> 00:08:53.419 century, there was a wildly popular con called 00:08:53.419 --> 00:08:57.220 the Spanish prisoner. Wait, the 1700s? Yes, the 00:08:57.220 --> 00:09:00.639 1700s. Con artists would write physical letters 00:09:00.639 --> 00:09:03.960 to wealthy merchants in England or France. And 00:09:03.960 --> 00:09:06.779 the story in the letter was always. I am a wealthy 00:09:06.779 --> 00:09:08.980 aristocrat, and I have been wrongly imprisoned 00:09:08.980 --> 00:09:12.159 in a castle in Spain. Let me guess. They had 00:09:12.159 --> 00:09:15.120 a hidden fortune. Exactly. I have a fortune hidden 00:09:15.120 --> 00:09:17.399 away, but I need a small amount of money right 00:09:17.399 --> 00:09:19.960 now to bribe the prison guards to let me escape. 00:09:20.480 --> 00:09:22.480 If you send the bribe money, I will share the 00:09:22.480 --> 00:09:24.460 fortune with you. And let me take another guess. 00:09:25.220 --> 00:09:27.580 I bet they also had a beautiful daughter. They 00:09:27.580 --> 00:09:29.820 almost always had a beautiful daughter. The letter 00:09:29.820 --> 00:09:31.960 would say, my lovely daughter is here with me 00:09:31.960 --> 00:09:34.299 in hiding. And as a bonus, I will give you her 00:09:34.299 --> 00:09:37.460 hand in marriage. So even the romance scam angle 00:09:37.460 --> 00:09:41.019 is centuries old. It is ancient. There is another 00:09:41.019 --> 00:09:43.159 famous version from the 1800s called The Letter 00:09:43.159 --> 00:09:45.399 from Jerusalem. We found that one detailed in 00:09:45.399 --> 00:09:48.259 the memoirs of Eugene Francois Vidocq, who was 00:09:48.259 --> 00:09:51.429 this famous French. criminal turned police detective. 00:09:51.429 --> 00:09:54.870 Wow. And then a strikingly similar variant swept 00:09:54.870 --> 00:09:58.950 through Germany in 1922. The medium constantly 00:09:58.950 --> 00:10:01.110 changes. It goes from handwritten letters to 00:10:01.110 --> 00:10:04.289 faxes, to emails, to social media DMs, but the 00:10:04.289 --> 00:10:06.889 basic software running in the human brain. That 00:10:06.889 --> 00:10:09.190 hasn't changed a bit. We are still driven by 00:10:09.190 --> 00:10:12.129 greed and by the deep desire to be the hero of 00:10:12.129 --> 00:10:14.350 someone else's story. That is the real hook, 00:10:14.509 --> 00:10:16.169 isn't it? It is not just about getting rich quick. 00:10:16.250 --> 00:10:18.629 It is about feeling like you are the one special 00:10:18.629 --> 00:10:21.990 person chosen by fate to help this desperate 00:10:21.990 --> 00:10:24.830 prince. Precisely. It flatters the ego. But as 00:10:24.830 --> 00:10:27.330 we've moved into the modern era, people generally 00:10:27.330 --> 00:10:29.389 have gotten wise to the prince narrative. So 00:10:29.389 --> 00:10:31.750 the stammers have had to diversify their portfolios. 00:10:32.149 --> 00:10:35.070 The prince is now the recruiter. Ah, the employment 00:10:35.070 --> 00:10:38.370 scams. These ones honestly make me the angriest 00:10:38.370 --> 00:10:41.090 because they specifically target people who are 00:10:41.090 --> 00:10:43.769 already struggling to find work. It is incredibly 00:10:43.769 --> 00:10:46.690 predatory. You post your resume on a legitimate 00:10:46.690 --> 00:10:49.009 job board and you get an out of the blue offer. 00:10:49.210 --> 00:10:51.769 It's a great salary, full benefits, work from 00:10:51.769 --> 00:10:54.730 home. But before you can officially start, HR 00:10:54.730 --> 00:10:57.009 tells you that you need to pay upfront for a 00:10:57.009 --> 00:10:59.570 background check or a specialized training software 00:10:59.570 --> 00:11:02.230 or a work permit. And then there's that really 00:11:02.230 --> 00:11:05.049 specific twist on this, the mystery shopper variant. 00:11:05.490 --> 00:11:07.750 This one is so clever because the scammers actually 00:11:07.750 --> 00:11:10.590 send you money first. Yes. This one relies on 00:11:10.590 --> 00:11:12.950 a very specific quirk in the banking system. 00:11:13.509 --> 00:11:15.570 The victim is hired to be a mystery shopper, 00:11:15.590 --> 00:11:17.929 and they receive a real -looking cashier's check 00:11:17.929 --> 00:11:21.169 in the mail for, let's say, $2 ,000. OK. Their 00:11:21.169 --> 00:11:23.389 first assignment is to deposit the check, keep 00:11:23.389 --> 00:11:26.549 $200 as their salary, and then wire the remaining 00:11:26.549 --> 00:11:29.470 $1 ,800 to a specific service to test the speed 00:11:29.470 --> 00:11:31.970 and customer service of the local Western Union. 00:11:32.169 --> 00:11:34.990 And so the victim goes to their bank, deposits 00:11:34.990 --> 00:11:37.549 the check, sees the funds appear in their available 00:11:37.549 --> 00:11:39.980 balance the next day, and thinks, wow, this is 00:11:39.980 --> 00:11:42.259 totally legitimate, I have the money. Right, 00:11:42.480 --> 00:11:45.399 because federal law requires banks to make deposited 00:11:45.399 --> 00:11:47.700 funds available to customers quickly, usually 00:11:47.700 --> 00:11:50.879 within a day or two. But the physical check itself 00:11:50.879 --> 00:11:53.460 is a forgery, and it hasn't actually cleared 00:11:53.460 --> 00:11:56.659 the issuing bank yet. Oh no. So two weeks later, 00:11:56.860 --> 00:12:00.000 the forged check bounces. The bank realizes it's 00:12:00.000 --> 00:12:02.740 fake and clause that $2 ,000 right back out of 00:12:02.740 --> 00:12:05.299 the victim's account. But the victim has already 00:12:05.299 --> 00:12:08.759 voluntarily wired $1 ,800 of their own real money 00:12:08.759 --> 00:12:10.840 to the scammers. That money is just gone. Gone. 00:12:11.179 --> 00:12:13.779 And now the victim often owes their bank money, 00:12:13.980 --> 00:12:16.100 on top of losing their own savings. It effectively 00:12:16.100 --> 00:12:18.279 turns the victim into the bag holder for a fake 00:12:18.279 --> 00:12:21.220 check. That is brutal. And then you have the 00:12:21.220 --> 00:12:23.700 scams that target our hearts instead of our wallets 00:12:23.700 --> 00:12:27.179 directly, the pet scams. Yes. You see ads online 00:12:27.179 --> 00:12:30.570 for high -value puppies. French bulldogs, Yorkies. 00:12:30.929 --> 00:12:33.289 The seller always has a heartbreaking story. 00:12:33.909 --> 00:12:35.909 I am a missionary moving to a country that doesn't 00:12:35.909 --> 00:12:37.450 allow dogs. I just want a good home for him. 00:12:37.529 --> 00:12:39.610 You just need to pay for the shipping. Then the 00:12:39.610 --> 00:12:41.669 dog doesn't even exist. Doesn't exist. Not even 00:12:41.669 --> 00:12:44.009 a real picture. You pay the shipping fee and 00:12:44.009 --> 00:12:46.370 then a fake airline emails you. They say the 00:12:46.370 --> 00:12:49.269 crate is too small. Send $500 for a climate -controlled 00:12:49.269 --> 00:12:52.210 crate. Then the dog needs surprise travel insurance. 00:12:52.600 --> 00:12:55.179 Then emergency veterinary shots at a layover. 00:12:55.539 --> 00:12:58.279 The fees never end. But the absolute darkest 00:12:58.279 --> 00:13:00.940 evolution of this has to be the romance scam. 00:13:01.460 --> 00:13:02.940 We touched on it with the Spanish prisoner's 00:13:02.940 --> 00:13:06.269 daughter. But with modern social media, this 00:13:06.269 --> 00:13:09.409 has turned into industrial warfare on human loneliness. 00:13:09.730 --> 00:13:12.289 It really is. This is the long con. Scammers 00:13:12.289 --> 00:13:14.509 will spend months, sometimes over a year, just 00:13:14.509 --> 00:13:16.309 building an emotional relationship. They text 00:13:16.309 --> 00:13:18.269 you good morning every single day. They Skype 00:13:18.269 --> 00:13:20.789 you. And they use stolen video loops of attractive 00:13:20.789 --> 00:13:22.809 people or voice changing software to pull it 00:13:22.809 --> 00:13:25.690 off. They make the victim feel completely seen 00:13:25.690 --> 00:13:28.190 and loved. And then the inevitable crisis hits. 00:13:28.470 --> 00:13:30.600 Right. I am finally coming to visit you, but 00:13:30.600 --> 00:13:33.940 I am stuck at customs and need visa money. Or 00:13:33.940 --> 00:13:36.340 my child was in a terrible car accident and I 00:13:36.340 --> 00:13:39.220 need hospital fees. And because the victim is 00:13:39.220 --> 00:13:43.220 genuinely in love, they pay. There is a deeply 00:13:43.220 --> 00:13:45.639 heartbreaking case we looked at regarding a woman 00:13:45.639 --> 00:13:48.419 named Jet Jacobs. Yes, the Australian woman. 00:13:48.539 --> 00:13:51.519 She was 67 years old, living in Australia. She 00:13:51.519 --> 00:13:54.500 met a man online who called himself Jesse Oroo. 00:13:54.620 --> 00:13:57.179 And she really thought he was the one. She did. 00:13:57.539 --> 00:13:59.220 Over the course of three years, she sent him 00:13:59.220 --> 00:14:02.879 over $90 ,000. But the tragedy is that it didn't 00:14:02.879 --> 00:14:06.710 stop at just financial ruin. In 2013, she actually 00:14:06.710 --> 00:14:08.629 flew to Johannesburg, South Africa to finally 00:14:08.629 --> 00:14:11.509 meet him in person. Two days after she arrived, 00:14:11.549 --> 00:14:14.409 she was found dead in her rented villa. Omoko 00:14:14.409 --> 00:14:17.110 had immediately fled the country back to Nigeria. 00:14:17.570 --> 00:14:19.350 He was eventually tracked down and arrested, 00:14:19.529 --> 00:14:21.750 but due to a severe lack of forensic evidence 00:14:21.750 --> 00:14:23.690 regarding the actual cause of death, he was only 00:14:23.690 --> 00:14:25.730 charged with fraud. That is just horrifying. 00:14:25.769 --> 00:14:27.950 It really shifts the perspective away from this 00:14:27.950 --> 00:14:30.970 being a silly email in your spam folder to recognizing 00:14:30.970 --> 00:14:34.090 these people as predatory monsters. It absolutely 00:14:34.090 --> 00:14:36.600 does. and it forces us to ask a really difficult 00:14:36.600 --> 00:14:39.850 question. Why do people stay in these scams even 00:14:39.850 --> 00:14:41.769 when the red flags start waving right in their 00:14:41.769 --> 00:14:44.590 face? Obviously, a huge part of it is the sunk 00:14:44.590 --> 00:14:47.429 cost fallacy. Right. The idea that I've already 00:14:47.429 --> 00:14:51.049 paid $5 ,000. I have to pay this next $1 ,000 00:14:51.049 --> 00:14:54.470 fee or I lose everything I've invested. Exactly. 00:14:54.830 --> 00:14:57.429 But there is a very specific legal trap here 00:14:57.429 --> 00:15:00.289 too, right? Something called the unclean hands 00:15:00.289 --> 00:15:02.710 doctrine. This seems to be the psychological 00:15:02.710 --> 00:15:04.909 glue that keeps victims silent. Yeah, let's talk 00:15:04.909 --> 00:15:06.889 about that because it is essentially pure black. 00:15:06.919 --> 00:15:09.720 and it is baked right into the scammers initial 00:15:09.720 --> 00:15:11.799 narrative. Think about the pitch they use. I 00:15:11.799 --> 00:15:13.799 need you to help me smuggle stolen gold out of 00:15:13.799 --> 00:15:16.759 the country or help me hide this embezzled government 00:15:16.759 --> 00:15:19.379 money from auditors. So if you agree to help 00:15:19.379 --> 00:15:21.820 them, you are explicitly agreeing to commit a 00:15:21.820 --> 00:15:25.059 major crime. Exactly. The victim genuinely believes 00:15:25.059 --> 00:15:27.580 they are acting as a co -conspirator in international 00:15:27.580 --> 00:15:30.720 money laundering or bribery. So when the scammer 00:15:30.720 --> 00:15:32.559 finally steals their money, who are they going 00:15:32.559 --> 00:15:34.460 to call? You can't call the police. You can't 00:15:34.460 --> 00:15:37.059 just say, hello, officer. I was actively trying 00:15:37.059 --> 00:15:40.159 to launder millions for a corrupt warlord, and 00:15:40.159 --> 00:15:42.620 he ripped me off. They are completely trapped 00:15:42.620 --> 00:15:44.820 by their own guilt. There was a really prominent 00:15:44.820 --> 00:15:47.559 case involving a businessman from San Diego named 00:15:47.559 --> 00:15:51.580 James Adler. He lost over $5 million to a scheme 00:15:51.580 --> 00:15:54.399 exactly like this. And he actually tried to fight 00:15:54.399 --> 00:15:56.679 back. He tried to sue the Nigerian government 00:15:56.679 --> 00:15:58.940 officials and the central bank in a U .S. federal 00:15:58.940 --> 00:16:01.919 court. That sounds incredibly bold. How did that 00:16:01.919 --> 00:16:04.759 actually play out? It failed completely. The 00:16:04.759 --> 00:16:07.559 court applied that unclean hands doctrine. The 00:16:07.559 --> 00:16:10.580 judge essentially ruled. You willingly entered 00:16:10.580 --> 00:16:13.940 into a contract to perform an illegal act, specifically 00:16:13.940 --> 00:16:16.700 bribery and money laundering. You cannot use 00:16:16.700 --> 00:16:19.220 the United States court system to recover losses 00:16:19.220 --> 00:16:22.159 from an illegal contract. Wow. So the legal system 00:16:22.159 --> 00:16:24.539 essentially protects the scammer because the 00:16:24.539 --> 00:16:27.039 victim's hands were dirty too. And that profound 00:16:27.039 --> 00:16:30.000 shame, that terror of admitting complicity in 00:16:30.000 --> 00:16:32.860 a felony, is exactly what allows these syndicates 00:16:32.860 --> 00:16:36.139 to operate with near total impunity. But sometimes, 00:16:36.220 --> 00:16:38.340 as we saw with court Jet Jacobs, the silence 00:16:38.340 --> 00:16:41.419 isn't just about shame or legal fears. It is 00:16:41.419 --> 00:16:44.389 about immediate physical safety. I want to talk 00:16:44.389 --> 00:16:47.210 about the invitation to visit phase because this 00:16:47.210 --> 00:16:49.809 seems to be the endgame for the really high -rolling 00:16:49.809 --> 00:16:52.029 victims. This is undoubtedly the most dangerous 00:16:52.029 --> 00:16:55.169 phase of the con. If a victim has really deep 00:16:55.169 --> 00:16:57.610 pockets but starts getting skeptical and refuses 00:16:57.610 --> 00:17:00.409 to send more wires, the scammer changes tactics. 00:17:00.649 --> 00:17:02.649 They say, fine, don't believe me, keep your money. 00:17:02.929 --> 00:17:05.170 But if you want the fortune, you have to fly 00:17:05.170 --> 00:17:07.950 to Nigeria or South Africa or Togo. Come meet 00:17:07.950 --> 00:17:09.950 the bank manager in person. Sign the release 00:17:09.950 --> 00:17:11.710 papers yourself. And the victim thinks, well, 00:17:11.710 --> 00:17:13.869 OK, that proves them must be real. A scammer 00:17:13.869 --> 00:17:15.910 wouldn't invite me to a physical bank. Exactly. 00:17:16.230 --> 00:17:18.390 But they aren't walking into a bank. They're 00:17:18.390 --> 00:17:20.250 walking straight into a coordinated kidnapping. 00:17:21.309 --> 00:17:24.390 In 1999, a Norwegian millionaire named Kajet 00:17:24.390 --> 00:17:27.829 Helmo was lured to South Africa under this exact 00:17:27.829 --> 00:17:31.509 pretense. He was murdered. In 2004, a Greek man 00:17:31.509 --> 00:17:34.049 named George McEnally was lured to South Africa 00:17:34.049 --> 00:17:37.329 and killed. In 2008, a Javanese businessman. 00:17:37.579 --> 00:17:40.779 Osamah Hitomi was kidnapped the moment he landed 00:17:40.779 --> 00:17:44.160 in Johannesburg and held for a five million dollar 00:17:44.160 --> 00:17:46.940 ransom. It's just terrifying. You get on a commercial 00:17:46.940 --> 00:17:48.819 flight thinking you're about to close the business 00:17:48.819 --> 00:17:51.279 deal of a lifetime and you are met at the arrivals 00:17:51.279 --> 00:17:53.779 gate by an armed organized crime syndicate. And 00:17:53.779 --> 00:17:55.960 the psychological toll of all this manipulation, 00:17:55.980 --> 00:17:58.480 it literally breaks people's minds. Sometimes 00:17:58.480 --> 00:18:00.380 that violence actually goes the other direction. 00:18:01.200 --> 00:18:04.160 In 2003, there was a terrible tragedy in Prague. 00:18:04.759 --> 00:18:07.759 A 72 -year -old Czech man named Zsuzsi Pasovsky 00:18:07.759 --> 00:18:10.559 had lost his entire life savings, about $600 00:18:10.559 --> 00:18:14.160 ,000, to a Nigerian advance fee scam. And he 00:18:14.160 --> 00:18:16.660 just finally snapped. He was completely desperate. 00:18:16.759 --> 00:18:18.980 He went to the Nigerian embassy in Prague to 00:18:18.980 --> 00:18:21.119 demand help recovering his money. The embassy 00:18:21.119 --> 00:18:22.900 officials, of course, couldn't do anything. It's 00:18:22.900 --> 00:18:24.839 not like the embassy operates the scam or has 00:18:24.839 --> 00:18:27.779 the money. Pasofsky pulled out a handgun right 00:18:27.779 --> 00:18:30.480 there and shot the Nigerian consul dead. That 00:18:30.480 --> 00:18:33.259 is just tragedy stacked on top of tragedy. It 00:18:33.259 --> 00:18:36.579 really shows the massive blast radius of these 00:18:36.579 --> 00:18:39.339 crimes. It is not just numbers vanishing from 00:18:39.339 --> 00:18:42.460 a bank ledger. It is entire families destroyed, 00:18:42.960 --> 00:18:45.440 lives ended, and normal people pushed to the 00:18:45.440 --> 00:18:48.589 absolute brink of sanity. It is deeply sobering. 00:18:48.650 --> 00:18:51.609 And just to put a scale on this, the FBI reported 00:18:51.609 --> 00:18:54.569 that in a recent single year, Americans lost 00:18:54.569 --> 00:18:57.009 billions of dollars to these types of confidence 00:18:57.009 --> 00:18:59.650 frauds. And remember, because of the shame and 00:18:59.650 --> 00:19:02.130 the unclean hands trap, that number is only what 00:19:02.130 --> 00:19:04.529 was actually reported. The real number is likely 00:19:04.529 --> 00:19:07.049 double or triple that. Oh, and before we wrap, 00:19:07.210 --> 00:19:09.230 we should mention that mobile tower variant we 00:19:09.230 --> 00:19:11.509 saw in the research, just to show how localized 00:19:11.509 --> 00:19:13.880 this can get. Oh, right. The one in India and 00:19:13.880 --> 00:19:16.619 Pakistan. Yeah. Instead of Prince, scammers target 00:19:16.619 --> 00:19:19.579 rural landowners. They promise them huge rental 00:19:19.579 --> 00:19:21.359 payouts if they let a telecom company install 00:19:21.359 --> 00:19:23.859 a mobile cell tower on their farm. But first, 00:19:24.119 --> 00:19:25.640 the farmer has to pay for government clearance 00:19:25.640 --> 00:19:28.859 charges and fake land survey fees. It's the exact 00:19:28.859 --> 00:19:31.700 same advance fee software, just a different skin 00:19:31.700 --> 00:19:35.019 to match the local economy. Exactly. So we have 00:19:35.019 --> 00:19:38.140 gone from the funny Prince meme all the way to 00:19:38.140 --> 00:19:41.579 kidnapping, murder, and billions in global losses. 00:19:41.900 --> 00:19:43.880 It really feels like we need to fundamentally 00:19:43.880 --> 00:19:45.960 change how we interact with our spam folders. 00:19:46.240 --> 00:19:48.240 We really do. I think the major takeaway from 00:19:48.240 --> 00:19:50.480 all these sources is that advanced fee fraud 00:19:50.480 --> 00:19:53.660 is a historic, centuries -old confidence trick 00:19:53.660 --> 00:19:56.470 that has just perfectly adapted to the digital 00:19:56.470 --> 00:19:59.450 age. It weaponizes our own baseline psychology 00:19:59.450 --> 00:20:02.450 against us, our greed, our hope, our desperate 00:20:02.450 --> 00:20:04.829 need for connection, and our fear of missing 00:20:04.829 --> 00:20:08.230 out. And it uses that genius filter of bad grammar 00:20:08.230 --> 00:20:10.549 to make sure it only finds the people who are 00:20:10.549 --> 00:20:12.529 the most vulnerable to that manipulation. Right. 00:20:12.549 --> 00:20:14.690 It finds them, it isolates them, and then it 00:20:14.690 --> 00:20:17.529 uses shame and legal fear to keep them completely 00:20:17.529 --> 00:20:19.430 quiet. So I want to leave everyone listening 00:20:19.430 --> 00:20:21.289 with a final thought today. The next time you 00:20:21.289 --> 00:20:23.529 open your email and you see that ridiculous subject 00:20:23.529 --> 00:20:26.680 line, Dearest one, I have a proposition and you 00:20:26.680 --> 00:20:29.299 see all the crazy typos and you start to chuckle. 00:20:29.740 --> 00:20:31.759 Stop. Please don't laugh at it. Because that 00:20:31.759 --> 00:20:35.640 email is not a joke. It is a finely tuned, highly 00:20:35.640 --> 00:20:38.160 efficient weapon. And the fact that we laugh 00:20:38.160 --> 00:20:40.599 at it. That is exactly what the syndicates are 00:20:40.599 --> 00:20:42.680 counting on. Our laughter makes us dismiss it 00:20:42.680 --> 00:20:45.319 as harmless. It lets us ignore the scale of the 00:20:45.319 --> 00:20:47.579 industry. And while we are laughing, that weapon 00:20:47.579 --> 00:20:50.299 is sliding right past us, searching the internet 00:20:50.299 --> 00:20:52.259 for the one person who doesn't get the joke. 00:20:52.579 --> 00:20:54.619 And it is going to take absolutely everything 00:20:54.619 --> 00:20:57.259 they have. That is the grim reality. But I'll 00:20:57.259 --> 00:20:58.920 add one more thing for you to chew on, something 00:20:58.920 --> 00:21:00.720 we didn't cover in the sources, but that is coming 00:21:00.720 --> 00:21:05.579 fast. Think about artificial intelligence. Generative 00:21:05.579 --> 00:21:09.859 AI can write perfect, highly persuasive, grammatically 00:21:09.859 --> 00:21:13.220 flawless emails. It can clone voices perfectly. 00:21:13.759 --> 00:21:15.740 When the scammers no longer need the bad grammar 00:21:15.740 --> 00:21:17.740 to filter out the skeptics, when they can generate 00:21:17.740 --> 00:21:20.380 bespoke, highly personalized traps for smart 00:21:20.380 --> 00:21:23.420 people at scale, how are any of us going to spot 00:21:23.420 --> 00:21:25.839 the hook before it's too late? That is a terrifying 00:21:25.839 --> 00:21:28.099 thought to end on. Stay skeptical out there, 00:21:28.339 --> 00:21:30.779 friends. And remember, if it sounds too good 00:21:30.779 --> 00:21:33.480 to be true, it definitely is. Thanks for diving 00:21:33.480 --> 00:21:35.490 deep with us. We will see you on the next one.