There are Nigerian scammers out there trying to scam deaf people. They choose to target deaf communities because they think they can fool us.
Here are some things you need to know in order to protect yourself from being scammed.
1.) There is NO such thing as "free money." If anyone offers you free money, you should automatically consider him/her a scammer. Period! If someone on AllDeaf offers you free money, report that member to me ASAP.
2.) No one works for me. I work alone. If anyone says they work for me on AllDeaf and have selected you as a winner of some prize, they are lying. Report the liar to me ASAP.
3.) Never, ever give out your email address to anyone on AllDeaf, unless you know them personally. Use AllDeaf's private messaging system instead, that's why it was created in the first place.
4.) A scammer usually starts by telling you that he/she is looking for a soulmate, they try to sweet talk to you and make you feel special. Sometimes they even claim to be part of a church group or whatever. Don't fall for their nonsense!
5.) Again, there is NO SUCH THING AS FREE MONEY! A scammer usually asks for your home address, then they send you a fake check which looks real but it's not. They want you to deposit the check at your bank (usually around $3,000) and want you to send him/her 90% cash and you keep 10% cash for "helping out." That's a RED FLAG right there!
If you want to help and add some tips on how to protect deaf people from being scammed, feel free to post here.
Edit: Anyone who has been contacted by a scammer via AIM/MSN/YIM, can you please let me know their screen name so I can make it known to the deaf community. By knowing their screen name, we can block them from contacting us.
Also, anyone has a fake check in hand, if you don't mind, can you please scan it and send me a copy via email so I can show our members what these checks look like? I'll make sure your name on the check is not shown.
The BAD NEWS IS: The ex-roommated still go to the DeafChat scamming people for money with false information they are using to fools them, I've tried to warn everybody from the DeafChat, they don't listen.
That is deafchat's problem and all you do is pray someday the deaf chatters will wake up and realized that you were right.
Marie
The people that I used to roommated from Oct 2003 to May 2004, one white girl is from Canada has no green card and is living in Penn with another man and her other husband is black is from Virginia, they both got married in Oct 2003 and I interpreter for them at the courthouse on the day of their marriage...They separated in the fall of 2004, first we roommated in New York and her husband fooled my fiance about the 4.8 millions in 3 box coming from Nigerian and he handed the fake key to my fiance, playing the games on my fiance, made my fiance believed they're getting the money, it was all a lies, my fiance gave him more money in order to get the 4.8 millions, found out until we all moved to Las Vegas which my fiance looks up Nigerian Scams and found those information that our ex-roommated used to fooled him, he felted like an idiots, but I told him you're not the onlys one lose the money, others have lost their money to those couple too, our other ex-roommate lost over $5,000. on those couple, yes my fiance and other ex-roommate got scammed by those couple, both couple are deaf, as long that girl is married to that black guy, she's involved with her husband scamming innocent people, we found out that time she separated from her husband and she said that her husband owe 60 to 100 of people's money, our jaw dropped, it's a shocked.
I like to give their name out, but it might be against the rule here, but these couple are dangerous people, playing tricks on many people, they have to be stopped from hurting more innocent people, yes my fiance lost the money so did the other ex-roommate of ours, we roommated with internet people and we learned the hard lesson from the couple played the tricks on us, they are bad news, they stole my exercise video plus she came close to keeps my heart necklace she stole from me and she puts them back when I mentioned about the heart necklace was missing, so one of my storage bin was missing, she kept it and lied to me saying she don't have it, so I lost some valuable stuff...
I just want you all to know Do Not RoomMate with Internet People you Meet On the Net, there might be more people like our ex-roommate, stealing and lying, using people to get their needs, they are not honest people who cannot be trusted periodly, you should not trusted anyone, either they are deaf or not, hearing impaired or not, I learned the hard lesson from my interpreter from Las Vegas, she was shocked to learned that I was roommated with 4 people from the Net, she told me that people from the DeafChat looks for people to USE, to STEALS, to roommate to use you to help them with rent and bills to live in the state of their dreams, plus to steals your stuff too...
The couple dreamed to live in Las Vegas, we shouldn't have went along with it...
They're desparated for a roommate to live in their dream, because her husband cannot afford to live alone with her, he used us to helps with rent and bills to live in their dream to live in Las Vegas, his wife did not help with the rent and bills, just me one woman and 2 men plus her husband pay half the rent and bills, there's more story to it anyway...
Hope others will learns from my mistake also my fiance's mistake also one other roommate's mistake too....This isn't a Prank, it's Real, it has really happend to us and it sure was a NightMare!!!
Wow, PowerWCRulez, I didn't expect to see you on AllDeaf. Remember me from HipTop?
Anyway, the FBI cannot do anything about it, if it goes through UPS, DHL FedEx, etc. Make sure to tell the scammer to send it through the regular USPS (United States Postal Service) mail. If they send it through USPS, then it's mail fraud, and they can do something about it.
I blogged about this.
Taric Alani's Video Blog (VLog) 0002 on
Hi, I'm Taric Alani. I'm here, in my room, using American Sign Language, but you may notice, this time, I'm not voicing. The reason why is a lot of people, in the Deaf community, prefer sign and voice separate. The reason why is English and ASL are not the same language. For example, word order is not the same, so my blog will still have voice, but it'll be separate from the sign. In my first blog, I discussed scam in Nigeria, because my videos are not available there. A lot of scammers get the IM screen name or e-mail of a Deaf person on deafVP.com and vplist.com, and they try to steal money from them. How do they do that? They send counterfeit money orders, and a lot of times, the Deaf person completely buys it. Don't believe their mendacity! Please, if you have IM name or e-mail address on there, please remove it. Ok, I hope I've been helpful today. If you have any more future comments or suggestions, tell me. I want to know what you want to see in my future videos. Thank you for watching!
Here's another one for YIM name is yetti_sweetie23. This person claimed someone kidnaped her mother and took her to Nigeria, she had to fly there to get her mother, and now has no money to get her and her mother back. I saw this one coming from a mile away.
I even went so far as to get how much money she "has" to get her and her mom back home and found a site to get tickets from there to her supposed home. Found 2 tickets she could afford as well. Just in case. It's funny how hard she fought that info and said she still needed the money.
Anyway, watch out for her/him.
Oh yeah, I met this person in deafchat chatroom. I can't remember the name they used though. Watch out for these douche-monkies in there.
Yeah, I don't know why people go for online relationships.The people that I used to roommated from Oct 2003 to May 2004, one white girl is from Canada has no green card and is living in Penn with another man and her other husband is black is from Virginia, they both got married in Oct 2003 and I interpreter for them at the courthouse on the day of their marriage...They separated in the fall of 2004, first we roommated in New York and her husband fooled my fiance about the 4.8 millions in 3 box coming from Nigerian and he handed the fake key to my fiance, playing the games on my fiance, made my fiance believed they're getting the money, it was all a lies, my fiance gave him more money in order to get the 4.8 millions, found out until we all moved to Las Vegas which my fiance looks up Nigerian Scams and found those information that our ex-roommated used to fooled him, he felted like an idiots, but I told him you're not the onlys one lose the money, others have lost their money to those couple too, our other ex-roommate lost over $5,000. on those couple, yes my fiance and other ex-roommate got scammed by those couple, both couple are deaf, as long that girl is married to that black guy, she's involved with her husband scamming innocent people, we found out that time she separated from her husband and she said that her husband owe 60 to 100 of people's money, our jaw dropped, it's a shocked.
I like to give their name out, but it might be against the rule here, but these couple are dangerous people, playing tricks on many people, they have to be stopped from hurting more innocent people, yes my fiance lost the money so did the other ex-roommate of ours, we roommated with internet people and we learned the hard lesson from the couple played the tricks on us, they are bad news, they stole my exercise video plus she came close to keeps my heart necklace she stole from me and she puts them back when I mentioned about the heart necklace was missing, so one of my storage bin was missing, she kept it and lied to me saying she don't have it, so I lost some valuable stuff...
I just want you all to know Do Not RoomMate with Internet People you Meet On the Net, there might be more people like our ex-roommate, stealing and lying, using people to get their needs, they are not honest people who cannot be trusted periodly, you should not trusted anyone, either they are deaf or not, hearing impaired or not, I learned the hard lesson from my interpreter from Las Vegas, she was shocked to learned that I was roommated with 4 people from the Net, she told me that people from the DeafChat looks for people to USE, to STEALS, to roommate to use you to help them with rent and bills to live in the state of their dreams, plus to steals your stuff too...
The couple dreamed to live in Las Vegas, we shouldn't have went along with it...
They're desparated for a roommate to live in their dream, because her husband cannot afford to live alone with her, he used us to helps with rent and bills to live in their dream to live in Las Vegas, his wife did not help with the rent and bills, just me one woman and 2 men plus her husband pay half the rent and bills, there's more story to it anyway...
Hope others will learns from my mistake also my fiance's mistake also one other roommate's mistake too....This isn't a Prank, it's Real, it has really happend to us and it sure was a NightMare!!!
I've seen people become boyfriend/girlfriend after knowing each other online for a few weeks and then meeting in person for the first time. Will those relationships last? I don't think so.
i never been send any money to people
Yeah, I don't know why people go for online relationships.
I don't like it when people are like... "So, we're boyfriend/girlfriend? We've known each other online for a year. So, we should be boyfriend/girlfriend!" Come on. Seriously. Why the hell should it be considered a relationship?
I've seen people become boyfriend/girlfriend after knowing each other online for a few weeks and then meeting in person for the first time. Will those relationships last? I don't think so.
With Nigerian scammers, an engagement can also be used as a scam itself. "I am going to do this, you mind helping me? I need money for this and that for our wedding. After time goes by, the scammer is collecting more and more money. At the same time, "Oh, while I'm working on this... you mind sending me a check for this much? I can't cash it here. Thanks." At the end, the scammer either disappears or calls off the wedding... with you losing a lot of money.