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"(one would do well to always avoid online transactions with anyone from Nigeria to play safe")

Sounds -- however unintentional -- bigoted.

I think the advice should be to avoid transactions with anyone you're not 100% confident of. In my experience, I've had fraud trouble (through eBay) mostly with people based in Asian countries. However that doesn't mean I've written off the entire continent.

I'd even go as far as to say that the way this is written is offensive to Nigerians, and could probably do with some rephrasing.

Agreed eco111, though the words "Nigerian" and "Scam" have frequently been linked in the past - any stranger on the web can rip you off.

They did this a lot when I was looking for an Apartment in Boise, Idaho. I would see listings for an apartment and then the same listing with a different out of country phone number.
I also got a broken English replay from one of theses stolen listing saying something to the tune of "Send your deposit western union to my account asap"

Hmmm. I don't find it bigoted. One of the great things about online transactions is that there is no way to know the age, sex, or race of the person at the other end of the transaction, and I think that's grand. I also think it makes it hard to accuse someone of being ageist/racist/sexist when they buy or sell that way.

I don't consider myself a bigot in the least, but I'll firmly state that I will never buy or sell any product via the internet to/from a Nigerian. If he or she showed up at my garage sale? Sure, fine. I'll happily do a cash transaction. But an internet sale that originates in Nigeria is a potential disaster in the making--to the point that I'd ridicule anyone for attempting it.

I always am sad that people will throw labels like "bigot", "sexist" and "racist" so freely. They're powerful words, and as someone who is deeply interested in the ideals of equality, it seems unfair to dissect a word of warning as a bigoted statement. Context and history should always be considered before throwing out such labels against another human being (as is the case of Nigerian scammers, whom I've been directly targeted numerous times online; it's not just an urban myth).

As Molly has noted above, I'd happily purchase and sell to someone from Nigeria in person. But unfortunately due to lax laws in the impoverished country, Nigeria has become a hotbed of internet scamming particular to chat and online sales, and almost anyone in internet security would advise, Nigerian transactions are to be avoided. I could have easily traded "Wichita" for "Nigeria" if that particular region had such a storied history of unscrupulous activity.

as an actual nigerian, i definitely find the wording of this post problematic & offensive. "nigerian" scam has come to be the shorthand for any kind of internet scam, but we have no way of knowing where the scammers actually reside.

besides, i receive daily scams from folks claiming to be from all around the globe--russia, middle east, china, kenya, you name it, but again who knows where they really are!

best practice: don't divulge personal info online unless you are certain that it will be reasonably safe.

I almost fell for one for one of these when I was looking for an apartment in NYC. $1200 for a three bedroom in the East Village at 1st and 8th! They even gave me the address of the place too.

What lazy writing.

To be sure, Nigeria's Internet scams are despicable. The perpetrators must be held accountable for their actions and the (corrupt, inefficient) Nigerian government has not done enough to prevent the problem. But please understand that these scams are the direct result of unimaginable poverty, soaring unemployment, and brute economic desperation--terrible conditions which I have witnessed firsthand as a Nigerian American.

The United States, on its worst day, in its worst neighborhood, could not even begin to replicate the horrendous, pitiful conditions that many of Nigeria's 150 million people live in every day.

Moreover, a responsible post would have mentioned that people from nearly all nationalities and ethnic backgrounds perpetrate Craigslist scams, including of course, native born, United States citizens.

Where is your cautionary warning regarding the dangers of conducting Internet business with our fellow Americans?

I'm embarrassed for your ignorance.

Gregory: You're not a bigot. You're just a lazy writer.

The whole point of craigslist is to be local, right? So why would you want to business with somebody with an international phone number for a rental or a couch?

j i: I completely, 100% agree with your assessment "why" online scamming is especially prevalent in Nigeria. I've had long chats with actual scammers, offering direct assistance to them if they'd just converse openly and honestly. I do not exaggerate when I say I've had extended conversations for hours on end hoping to connect with some of folks around the globe who initially wanted to dupe me out of my money. People are people to me, and I know it's not a personal desire to hurt me, but to benefit themselves in a nation where there are dire needs.

Perhaps I am indeed "lazy" for not listing all the reasons why the scamming happens in the first place. But I reiterate I'd issue a specific warning if there was a reoccurring rental scam being sourced directly to Silver Lake, where I live myself. I don't think warning others to avoid online transactions specific to a particular rental-related scam is outside of reason or care.

In fact it would take an article's length to fully investigate fairly the why's and how's of the social condition you're hoping to expose. So fair enough, I've oversimplified a complex matter...one that's effects and repercussions extend well beyond craigslist, AT or our discussion here. But then again, a warning should be fairly simple, and as others have noted, they have run into similar experiences and perhaps one should consider those being affected by the scams as fair handedly as those hoping to better their lives illegally.

"I'm embarrassed for your ignorance."

i'm embarassed for you nitpicking humorlessness. what a drag to get so PC on a small, witty allusion to a well known cultural phenomenon.

i have a book at my desk called "cry for help: 36 scam emails from africa" - maybe you want to write a scathing letter to ginkgo press too?

@ allsystemsghost: Then the title should have been ANOTHER AFRICA SCAM instead of making a point in making it seem as if all scams come from Nigeria.

"what a drag to get so PC on a small, witty allusion to a well known cultural phenomenon."

"so PC"? I don't think so. It just goes with the territory. Political, ethnic/racial, or religious topics--ESPECIALLY GENERALIZATIONS/STEREOTYPES--are always controversial topics, whether wit, good intention or whatever is the case.

Gregory --

nobody, least of all me, expects you to write a lengthy treatise on social structure. you can't address the complexities in the space of an AT post.

what i do expect, however, is better phrasing than:

"one would do well to always avoid online transactions with anyone from Nigeria to play safe."

i simply take offense to the generalization.

also, what "one would do well" to do is stay sharp and be careful when conducting any financial transaction with any party through any medium.

j i : Whoa whoa whoa. You're "embarrassed for his ignorance?"

Relax, smart guy. Your socioeconomic tutorial is completely irrelevant.

The fact remains, the word "NIGERIA" is a red flag on Craigslist.

uh, why would you rent an apartment without looking at it first? Wouldn't the fact that you couldn't actually get into the apartment prove it's a scam?

Sara48: please note there was no mention of region or country in the post's title. And because the source article specifically cites where the scams were originating from, I felt it would be fair to include that information inside the text.

As j i points out, there is an argument that by recommending "to avoid online transaction with anyone from Nigeria" I've poorly conveyed a warning with political or social insensitivity. I've acknowledged that particular viewpoint and consider it perfectly valid, albeit differently nuanced from my own. But I also strongly believe in the advice given due to the great possibility of online fraud via Nigerian transactions (I've tracked IPs when being the target before and they all tracked back to Nigeria; most don't mask or sub-route their locations). Warnings in essence are generalizations, so I'll accept the label smacked on my back.

In any regard, I appreciate all the input and feedback; I'd rather get the other side of the story in comments from readers than not, even at the expense of my own ego (ouch!). The truth is hardly ever painless.

I've rented two apartments sight unseen, both through brokers/realty companies. I could not visit the cities and look for apartments at the time. Maybe not ideal, but it happens. I would not do it through craigslist, however.

I was definitely put off by this post. The tone and wording seemed derogatory to Nigerians.

nighttrain: i'm a smart girl, not a smart guy.

gregory: i appreciate your comments. again, i really only objected to some of the generalizations in your posting. i think the premise of your posting is correct--we should all be more careful.

OH MY GOD

seariously AT people are starting to get so ridiculously demanding and arrogant.

Get over yourselves.

If your offended click "back" and move on to the next damn article.

I feel so sorry for the AT posters always having to deal with angry, disrespectful comments regarding their posts. They put time and energy into posting these articles and some pompous readers just complain and belittle the posts. It's disrespectful and just plain annoying.

FYI
Pompous: having an excessive sense of self-importance, usually displayed through exaggerated seriousness or stateliness in speech or manner.

sound right?

@aquarabbit
"uh, why would you rent an apartment without looking at it first?"

Apparently you have tried renting in NYC where it's pretty much a bloodsport. Vacancy rate are around 1% unless you can afford to pay for "luxury" apartment at around $3k a month and that doesn't include brokerage fees, first and last month security, deposit, etc. you're pretty much sh*t out of luck. In that desperation to be the next Carrie Bradshaw and start your sex and city life in NY you're more gullib...i mean susceptible to so call great deal from someone out of town but desperate to sublet their apartment right away.

Cassandra, thanks for your opinion, but I think that the fact that the site allows people to use comments, means that AT does in fact want its users' feedback.

I notice you left a comment rather than "clicking 'back' and moving on to the next damn article"?

I don't speak for everyone, but my question was with the wording in the post, which Gregory agrees was poorly conveyed. It was the 'from Nigeria' which bothered me, and I thought I'd point out the (important) distinction between 'from Nigeria', and 'based in Nigeria'.

Sorry you don't agree with leaving feedback, but it appears the writer does - I'll take his word over yours if that's ok with you.

cassandra158:

"If your offended click "back" and move on to the next damn article."

ummm...

1) it's "you're" not "your."

2) does "post a comment" not appear on your screen as it does on mine? gregory has handled the constructive criticism with grace. calm yourself.

I find it fascinating that ditmas claims to have received numerous scam emails from different countries.

I must just be exceedingly unloved, as the only scam emails I've received have all been from Nigerian "doctors, princes, consulates, and wealthy business men". All claiming to be from one country and one only. Where are my scam emails from Canada, China, or India?

Bigotry or just accuracy. You be the judge.

@cassandra158

I don't see how posting criticism of a post is being "disrespectful." I respect the poster, but I also thought that some of the wording/tone needed an adjustment.

I think open discourse makes for interesting reading!

Thanks TallulahBelle but like your issue was with the wording of Gregory's post, mine was (and is) with how comments are worded. They are not posted as feedback or constructive criticism, people are just more then often very catty, excessively rude and mean in their comments, and I know I'm not the only one who thinks this on AT. I'm sorry if that wasn't made clear enough, I thought it was.

Also j i, I definitely agree Gregory handled it with grace. And my main issue is with how people word their "constructive criticism" such as you have. (Please feel free to refer to the definition of pompous). If you fail to see my point please also refer to your comment which chooses to mock spelling errors and disparage other comments.

Thank you and have a nice day :)

Claire,
I don't mean at all that posting criticism is disrespectful, it's how people criticize. Some readers post their comments that just sound plain mean. Would you speak to someone the same way some people write here? I wouldn't.

Just must suck for the poster. That's all. Honestly, am I the only one who thinks this?

@aquarabbit
"uh, why would you rent an apartment without looking at it first?"

Not always a failsafe.

In the late '90's we found an ad for a Pasadena rental condo in the newspaper (how quaint!). We met a property manager who showed us the apartment on behalf of a landlord who lived in San Diego. We filled out an application, were offered the apartment, and sent a deposit to an address in San Diego.

We showed up to get the keys on the appointed day and the police were there. Turns out the "property manager" had broken into a vacant condo, showed it, and rented it to 21 people, all of whom had sent deposits to the "landlord."

I think this particular mode of communication sometimes makes us apt to forget we're all human, we all occasionally misstep or miscommunicate, and that a difference opinion should not mean a distrust/dislike for one another. I have certainly been "lazy", "stupid", "a bigot" or whatever else has been thrown at me at one time or another. In other words, I'm wonderfully human with a plethora of faults and mistakes to own up to.

I would bet if j i and I had met at a dinner party we would have had a pleasant and engaging conversation about the matter without any of the miscommunication that occurs online because we'd be face to face, recognizing and noticing facial expressions and body language. We'd also likely be more willing to give one another the benefit of the doubt and allow explanation. That's difficult to do online, especially on a blog, and the natural tendency seems to be to state a strong opinion, whether good or bad, and defend our stance with a black & white mentality. I think it's within the grey where we all benefit to learn.

Hopefully we can all remember we're all here to share, and criticism is an important...even necessary...aspect to AT's community. But I'd agree, we could all benefit by affording one another the empathy and manners we'd hope bestowed on ourselves. We contributors are just as apt to be hurt or offended as any other person online.

Cassandra, I agree with you that criticism can be awkward, but in my experience on AT, the most vitriolic comments haven't been directed at the posters, they've been about the apartments in the various contests / house tours.

I would hope that the AT bloggers are resilient enough to take some constructive feedback and respond in a mature way (Gregory's a good example), whether it's about the tone of voice they use, or the usability of the photo galleries on the site. It is a big part of the job, and until AT gives guidelines on what feedback is and isn't welcome, I really hope people continue to say what they think about the site - it leads to higher standards and a better service for us all.

Good lawd!

A friend who POSTED a rental received a scam offer to rent, involving a convoluted wire scheme--she happened to work as a federal fraud investigator at the time, so it didn't work out so well for them . . .

Cassandra is absolutely right. Sure, there's plenty of room for criticism, but zero room for pompous lectures. If you think there's room for any form of "criticism," well then there's plenty of room for me to post that your form of criticism is obnoxious, and you need to get over yourself.

The statement "I am embarrassed for your ignorance" is pompous, period. j i needs to learn how to criticize without being a holier-than-thou ass. Did I spell that right, smart girl?

WOW.

i think we all need to take a step back. we are forgetting the point of the article. Gregory isnt trying to say that ALL Nigerians and there for ALL Africans or ALL African Americans are bad and scandalous- he is simply stating one area where there have been notable scams relating to Apartments as this IS an Apartment oriented blog. Just as it is wrong for Gregory to judge others, it is wrong for those here to judge him. a simple matter of correction would have been more than efficient. if one is truly offended, surly an email sent to Gregory would have been sufficent and he in turn could have posted a retraction or correction. however, since we feel it is our duty to judge and scrutinize each other, i say this to you: i am embarrassed for you all to be so quick to jump to conclusions based on what is written on the internet. how dare we judge each other and enforce the need for qualifiers in our writings lest we offend ANYONE. in my short time on this earth if i have learned nothing else, i have learned that someone is always going to be offended by something and not always because we have actually offended their being or morals or values, but simply because they wish to be contrary. while i do not wish to say we should let all offenses slide, it would be worthy of our own characters to think before we rebut. do you truly think Gregory was trying to be racist? do you think he intentionally meant to single out one culture above another? perhaps as previously mentioned, we could have simply made him aware of the negative connotation and shared our own stories of scandals.

best to you all- and wish everyone peace of spirit.

"though scams originate from anywhere and everywhere, one would do well to particularly avoid online transactions from Nigerian sources."

I think all it really comes down to is a poor use of italics. :)

@cassandra158

"Some readers post their comments that just sound plain mean."

You sounded very mean in your original comment! Calling everyone pompous etc. Is it okay for you to do it, but not everyone else?

eek! let's all forgive, forget and call it a day.



look over there! is that ANYTHING that happens to be mid-century modern, vintage, and/or eames? cooooooool!


can we all be friends again now?

BACK TO THE TOPIC AT HAND....

I am very internet savy, and I almost fell prey to one of these schemes. "Goerge" was going to rent out his condo because his job had him traveling a lot. He explained that his craigslist post garnered a lot of attention and so I was the 32nd person in line for the apartment (which was AMAZING BTW), but that if I wanted to put down a fully refundable $700 deposit, I would have first dibs. I drove by the building. He emailed me a contract and everything.
Even towards the end, I was still unsure if it was a scam or if I was really going to miss out on a fabulous apartment in LA.
Turns out it was a total scam and someone posted weeks later that they were taken for $700 !

What a lazy, ill-informed journalist this Apartment Therapy writer is.

This is the first time I have ever been offended on good ole' Apartment Therapy. Such a shame.

i can't fully express how disgusted i am by both gregory's post and the majority of the reader comments, but i'll stick to the issue at hand:

there's so much difference between the spam on craigslist and doing business with a nigerian. people spam all kinds of nonsense on craigslist -- but how dare you all single out and prejudge an entire nation of people solely based on the fact that there is a well known fraud criminals use in their country (particularly when criminals use this same con in many other countries, including the us)?

there's a huge difference between spam email that's (supposed to have originated) from nigeria and fraudulent, and real email from a nigerian. i know because i get both on a regular basis -- the first, because i have an email account with yahoo and spammers are talented, and the second, because my best friend is nigerian (yoruba to be exact) and a biotechnologist at glaxo.

quite literally, before i read this atrocious diatribe, i emailed him to say "yo tunde -- are you on skype?" -- he's currently in switzerland and his team is working on phase 1 of a new sub-h pharmogenomic.

so if you're still confused about why this kind of post is ugly and maligning, consider this: while you all waste each other's time on AT making up stuff to worry about -- like the world's scammers and spammers that, under ridiculous pretenses, worm a couple of dollars out of the absolute basest of greedy idiots (because you *really REAALLLY* have to be dumb to fall for one of these scams) -- the nigerian i know most personally, closely and dearly is working like a dog *RIGHT THIS VERY MINUTE* to save millions of lives!!

i hope you all feel like the jerks you are.

but just as gregory didn't go so far as to 'call all nigerians scammers', i won't go so far as to call all of you who whined "what's the big deal? this post isn't so bad" self-absorbed bigoted as*holes.

instead, i'll just hang my head in shame for you all since you don't seem to have the good sense and/or decency to have shame for yourselves.

... i'm so mad i just have to post again.

because the absolute equivalent of how mad i am right now is how selfless, generous, decent and honest every nigerian i know is.

Gregory you did nothing wrong and wrote nothing wrong.

I'm personally offended by all the "P.C. people" and "do-gooders' who have called your comments "racists and/or wrong."

I wish all the "P.C. people and do-gooders" who attacked you were in this room with me, right now, so they could all see me give 'em "the finger."

All you ultra-sensitive P.C. people are in for a rude awakening when you get out of high school. Jeez. Grow up.

This happened to us. Our house is on the market right now in Silver Lake and a Google alert alerted my attention to the fact that someone was trying to rent our house out for $7,500. You gotta love Google Alerts. Anyway, we caught it right away and brought it to Craigslist's attention. They were immediately responsive- flagged and removed the post within about six hours. You can read about it here on our house's blog: http://2471silverridge.blogspot.com/2008/08/being-pimped-out-by-craigslist-against.html

There is no denying that Lagos, Nigeria is a hotbed of apartment rental scams.

No one is suggesting that all Nigerians are scammers or that all scammers are Nigerian, however "419" scams are clearly largely perpetrated by persons using IP addresses that trace back to Lagos, Nigeria.

Check out this site:
http://parishousingscamwatch.wordpress.com

and

http://parishousingscamwatch.wordpress.com/nigerian-scammers-who-are-they/