I wanted to illustrate this blog post with two screenshots of the Facebook accounts, but cannot do so, because the scammer obviously violated copyrights. Here is what I wanted to write in the text beneath the pictures:
William James [1]:
Have a closer look: the grant comes from the US Department of Education
and is addressed to St. Mary's University, not a grant to an individual
by an individual; more on William James in the text.
You may oversee the watermark of the company Alamy on the picture of a meeting.
I have been contacted by a scammer, who called himself Agent John Smith or William James (on the account he had written William james). John Smith or John Doe, what does it matter? Agent Smith in the movie Matrix has no given name by the way.
I thought a friend from the USA was contacting me on June the 7th this year, but as it turned out it was a fake account on her name. We know each other since the 1970ies and I visited her in the US a while ago; as I can't travel easily to the US anymore because I visited Iran. Normally we use snail mail or email or sometimes the FB messenger. After the „Hello how are you doing ??“ came a „Good to hear back from you,i'm doing pretty good and so happy now because life has really changed for better,not sure if you have heard about the great news about me yet?“ on the 8th of June. And: „I just got money from the (SCF)Strengthening Communities Fund,just wondering if you have heard about them yet??“ Finally: I applied before getting the money, I was told I'm eligible to receive the bonus money,I got $250.000 delivered to me through the Fedex agent after contacting them for my claiming.but anyway I think you should contact the agent and ask if you are eligible to apply for the program did you know how to do that ??“ Followed by a link [1]. I told her that I didn't need such a grant, because I was sure that this is a scam. Then on the 17th of November I got a „Happy thansgiveng?“ from her, which made me wonder as Thanksgiving is much earlier in Germany and has not the same importance that it has in the US, moreover we never exchanged Thanksgiving greetings during the past 40 years, but I answered: „Oh, yes, but our thanksgiving is earlier in the year, 1st of October. The big family reunion and festivity is Christmas here.“ The next day she came back to the topic of the grant and sent another link [2]. I replied with some background check on one of the scammer's pictures [3] - you can see that Edward Biały of Veniseptico Polska has the picture as William James. I contacted the scammer and he replied: „Congratulation on your grant as our verification team alerts that your data verification process was successful“; seriously? How could I be on the list of potential beneficiaries? He had anotherlist, a list of data, he wanted to collect:
„Full name........
Address......
Male/Female ...........
Age.....
Married/Single.....
Text or Phone Number.......
E-mail........
Date of birth .
Amount you earn per week and month...
Hearing or Deaf.......
Do you Own a house or Rent Appt........
Do you want cash or check?“
Of course, I didn't answer this, so he came back with:
„WHY DO YOU IGORNING ME....“
By the time I had already sent an email to my friend and then found out that the scammer had opened a second accound on her name with which he contactted me.
I answered with: „Are you sure you need to know the color of my grandfather's wooden leg?“ After this message he didn't answer.
The „Happy thansgiveng?“, a „What did he said?“ are unlike my friend, who taught at a university. And of course the „igorning“ is also a hint to the language level of the scammer.
Interesting is also that the scammer used two different accounts for the same scam - William James and Agent John Smith. Would this not be enough to know that it's a scam?
What might be the purpose of this scam? I don't think it's phishing as the data on „Amount you earn per week and month... / Hearing or Deaf....... / Do you Own a house or Rent Appt........“ is more likely used to categorize victims. I didn't play it further as I'm not a scam hunter. My educated guess is, that the scammer will ask for money to get the package with your zillion US$ across an obstacle – I would be a perfect victim as he could tell that he needs the money to bribe someone at customs.
It would be easy to think that people fall into this trap because of greed. Money for nothing, special offers, tricks etc. always are intended to get to your money. I've written last year about 65th Anniversary of the John Frum Movement [4]. Ever since studying social anthropology I've been interested in the John Frum movement, a cargo cult of Melanesia, specific to Tanna, an Island of Vanuatu. Who was John Frum? Maybe it has been a serviceman by the name of John Broom or John from (America); the Wikipedia article lists some possible origins for the name of the movement [5]. After the 2nd World War “followers of John Frum built symbolic landing strips to encourage American airplanes to land and bring them 'cargo'”. There are more cargo cults in Melanesia, but the John Frum movement is best known.
Agent John Smith is delivering cargo (a package of dollar bills) by FedEx as shown on pictures of the accounts. So the motives might be similar. Maybe there is a yearning for salvation [6] and the modern god is mammon. As we wouldn't accuse kids of greed when they expect gifts from Santa Claus, we should be lenient with victims of such scams but we should prosecute the scammers.
Links and Annotations:
[1] https://www.facebook.com/William-James-116565854374078/ William James
[2] https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61553591950249 Agent John Smith
[3] Please check: https://medicaltri.com/fr/veniseptico/ Veniseptico - Directement du fabricant en promotion or https://lopermedia.com/poland/veniseptico-co-to-jest-komentarze-cena/ Veniseptico Polska, co to jest, komentarze, cena – Jeszcze 6 miesięcy temu nosiła wyłącznie długie spodnie. Dziś zachwyca gładkimi nogami bez żylaków!
[4] https://rheumatologe.blogspot.com/2022/02/john-frum-movement-65th-anniversary.html
[5] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Frum
[6] There is much more in cargo cults than I could sketch here, but you could refer to: Lindstrom, Lamont. (2018) 2023. “Cargo cults”. In The Open Encyclopedia of Anthropology, edited by Felix Stein. Facsimile of the first edition in The Cambridge Encyclopedia of Anthropology. Online: http://doi.org/10.29164/18cargo
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