Stop finger pointing, people, get to the bottom of the situation. Everyone involved in these scams are scammers, victims and criminals

Why would ANYONE give you millions of dollars smuggled out of a 3rd world nation? And anyone caught trying to do this should be sent to prison with the scammers! Greedy...

Victims?!! Com'on, like the first no one is a victim here. Why would you take money from a poor country? These ppl are greedy and deserve to get scam they were trying to scam too.

A Congressman and a heart surgeon? Are these supposedly educated people complete dopes? If I was the heart surgeon I would be so embarrased that I was so stupid that I wouldnt have gone to ABC news. These things are always scams. I am constantly amazed by the the amount of people (especially highly educateded people) who fall for these types of scams.

My father had been conned out of $25,000 from the nigerian email scams. My father is an intelligent man, but he got caught up with the persuasive tactics and charm of the con artists. They appealed to my father's faith, (God be with you) and sense of family... made it so personal that he wanted it to be real. It had torn our family to shreds.

'Black money' is hardly the 'latest twist', it's been around for years! Your 'investigative' reporting leaves a lot to be desired!

I guess none of these 'victims' don't think to ask the simple question: How about if you GIVE me the chemical, and after I get all the black paint off, I'll give you half the money! That way, instead of making just $300,000, you'll make over $1 mill! Or, how about this question: Why not do it yourself and pocket the whole thing... what do you need me for? Sorry, but anyone who would fall for a NIGERIAN (geez, don't these scammers even bother to change the name of their country? Doesn't EVERYONE know about 'Nigerian scams'?) scheme borders on being brain dead. A fool and his money are soon parted. And in most cases, they deserve it. Would you want to be operated on by a heart surgeon who would fall for this scam? How did this idiot get through med school?

Its time to stop foul play.
Victims are thieves, scammers are thieves. Education is not an issue. Intelligence is not the problem. Its the human GREED the is the issue. You get greedy, you tend to loose all your marbles and get hosed by some GOOD thieves. As sad as it may sound, we all should take a lesson from this scamming and actually punish the victims since they have shown more greed than normal. They want to rip off a third world country. This has been going on for centuries and now they want their piece of African cake too.. lol
They should just do like the Nigerian leaders do, smuggle it out of the country in a suite case. Everyone involved with this scamming is a thief.

BTW why does everything bad have to be bad ? ummmm Nigeria calls it 419, before that it was Spanish advance fee or payment. Now America calls it Black money ? geepers ... I guess its not different when we started calling Katrina victims Refugees lol

I was scammed on an online dating service. Familiar to anyone? After weeks of chatting, exchanging photos (nothing erotic), my "friend" said she was "stranded" and needed money. I fell for it, but not twice. I'm telling everyone out there to be very, very skeptical of any online money exchange. And don't knock the "victims" unless you've NEVER thought twice about receiving online funds. Unlike other tempting inheritance scams, I was used, by a sick, demented Nigerian man pretending to be a woman. Disgusting!

I just recently got an e-mail saying that I had won $2.5 million pounds from the United Kingdom lottery. Do you have any idea how much that is in American dollars?! The guy claimed he was the Reverend William Smith. He called me several times and eventually said I'd need to send him $675 so they could "notorize that I wasn't a terrorist" and then they'd send me my check.
I checked the UK Lottery website which specifically said not to send any money to claim a prize. It also said if I hadn't bought a ticket, I wouldn't be winning anything. I found a website about internet scams and saw the same photos and graphics that had been on my email - they just changed the names. The good Rev insisted he was legit and seemed offended that I had so little faith... Remember, if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is!

Brian Ross has always sought a spot light, I am sure Nigeria would be an ideal at this time. I am from Nigeria but have lived in US long enough to realize that lawlessness is a way of eazy life in Nigeria. Bribery, theft and scam plus whatever else english language can use to qualify a life style. The pronoucement of what people do in Nigeria and the equation of it all to this country or any other as matter of fact needed a full investigation than Mr Ross's vacation and sight seeing of few hours and those in the US congress and the senate. The star powers and privilages, advertising schemes, all legally and carefully structured, yet Nigeria is the culprit because someone is thinking on a different line of survival. I am not angry Mr Ross, I just thought you should look in your backyard first before painting a whole Country like Nigeria struggling to recover from the oppression of colonialism(British)and answer one simple question. Are lobbyst and political contribution better words than scam. Please look some where else and let Nigeria fight for her goal to a better country for her citizens.

Funny, if you fall for all the garbage in an email letter, whether from Nigeria, Japan or Australia well, I would say you deserved it. Blindness is real when vission is lost. When one is greedy enough to fall for what you call Nigerian scam, that individual should look in the mirror because for responding to scam, you yourself is out to scam someone else.

WC Fields best said it there is a sucker born every day.
Once the United States makes it a crime then people would not fall for the scam anymore. The laws that are being broken are many and it should be enforced. Pointing at the Nigerians is not a solution. Both parties should be punished. Greed is not a crime but what they are attempting to do is. Money laundering etc.

I think you should look into online dating site because they are using that medium now as well. A family member has been taken for a ride by a couple of different men. They both clamed to be from england and to be well off but had no problems asking to be sent money. One even taped into her phone line and was making calls from were else but nigeria. The other was able to have credit cards put into her name without her ever knowing it. Take a guess were he was nigeria. These people are praying on single men and women looking for love and then riping them off. That is something to look into.

I find it simply amazing that people fall for this scam. Having said this, we all realize that the main tool of the scammers is the Internet and their computer. Perhaps an answer would be for a particularly rabid virus to be written. Something that would allow government agencies to monitor the machines of these scammers and even delete all their files. That could very easily be done. And how would we get this virus on the scammers' machines. Simple, they always seem to want financial information from their potential victim. Fine, send them an infected attachment purporting to provide that information and voila, the scammers click on the attachment while salivating at the prospect of making money and they are infected!
Just a thought.

The Brain Ross Black Money Investigation is nothing new, advance fee fraud aka 419 and scam is nothing new in Nigeria as well as in USA or around the world. People should be careful when they make decisions about their money, especially to people they do not know. In Nigeria 419 is open and accepted, though it is not ethical and legal, but what about in USA, where you have campaign soft money peddlers during election period. I think Brain Ross should have done something different, not only was the information in the investigation old, but totally not accurate, why would he claim that the per capital income of people leaving in Lagos is $1, that’s absolutely not true and inaccurate. You have a lot of Nigerians in Nigeria and around the world doing a lot of good stuff; we do not see Brain Ross investigating on that. I think if you going to report on a country as big as Nigeria, you need to be reflective of the totality of the country, regardless of your topic of investigation. Brain Ross; please do some investigation on corrupt cops in Baltimore, or Soft Money peddlers in Washington.

Hello,
Yes I was a big dummy on this one. I fell for it but you know what saved me being too poor. I was supposed to come up with $5000 and wire the guy the money and then I'd get a percentage of 5 million dollars. Luckily after I talked with the guy on the phone a few times I came to my senses. I did lose $20 on a phone card I purchased so I could call the guy. One time I called him and heard a party in the background thats when I realized something was up. I went online and searched scams and realized I was in the middle of an attempt at one. Luckily I opened a separate bank account that I only deposited $100 into which is the only info the scammers got from me. I couldn't of gotten enough money for them anyways. I am just glad I came to my senses before I started borrowing money or taking out a loan or something. Nothing in life is free and that is a valuble lesson.

I am in a situation of scam now. I have consulted the FBI, the local police and any one else that would listen to me. Every one says "It is a scam". Will I know that, but I don't know how to deal with it. I can forward various e-mails if you’re interested.

The first thing I learned when I came to this country was "If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is." I'm astonished at the caliber of people who, out of greed and stupidity allow themselves to be duped. Most of the time, the scammers actually tell their victims that the money they are trying to transfer was stolen from somebody or a dead man's family. Now one would think that these so called "victims" would see a red flag. If scammers stole from someone, what do you expect them to do when they get to you? Steal from you of course. So why would anyone be so dumb and gullible so as to fall for that? It beats my imagination. Perhaps one can conclude that the victims deserve what they get for trying to reap where they did not sow.

While I don't condone the nefarious activities of the Nigerian scammers and have very little sympathy for the victims, especially thos who allow greed to block their reasoning, I feel that scammers, called by any other name is bad. Personally, I feel that the Nigerian scammers are doing what some of our telemarketers, insurance swindlers, phony home repairmen, corrupt congressmen, corrupt CEOs, the likes of Jack Abramoff and Andrew Fastows of Enron, etc were doing. A thief is a thief is a thief. "If it sounds too good to be true" as they say, "it probably is." If there is no demand, there will be no supply.