Is that what they do? I've been under the impression that they never transfer you any money, that they just request incidental expenses which gullible idiots view as an investment against their cut of the X million promised.
Well, what I think they do is ostensibly ACH some funds over, which ostensibly hit your account. Because you "see" these funds in your account, you feel pretty hunky dory and pay the dude his little fee (of several thou). Meanwhile, a couple of things occur. One thing that seems to happen is that, eventually, the banks realize there are insufficient funds in the account to cover the ACH. Or else the ACH is reversed.
What I can't quite figure out is how they do this...perhaps their local bank is in cahoots...theoretically, a bank won't attempt to ACH funds to another bank unless they see the funds in the account. In the US, these funds are immediately withdrawn from the sending account, so they can't be withdrawn prior to the ACH going out. Perhaps there's some delay with Nigerian (or whatever) banks that fraudsters can exploit (or the fraudster is friends with the banker).
Another thing that can happen is that the ACH-er can contest the ACH and have it withdrawn. Your local bank will often be willing to show these funds as "available" if they see an equivalent amount already sitting in your account. Or perhaps, the personal info they have on you is enough for them to trust that you won't try to screw them because they have recourse.
Seems to me it would be a nice Cypherpunk experiment to try to set up some kind of anonymous account and try to trap the ACH, and withdraw it as fast as possible. I guess the question is, can egold (or whatever) receive ACHs? And of course, it would be nice that a fellow cypherpunk didn't (or couldn't) swindle the rest of us if we were some how able to bitch-slap these critters.
-TD
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ach I can't believe an ODFI would allow you to withdraw that much money before the RDFI is no longer able to perform a return.
A few times, I've tried requesting several thousand dollars expenses to investigate setting up the necessary account. Nobody's so much as replied to that proposition.
-- "Not your decision to make." "Yes. But it's the right decision, and I made it for my daughter." - Bill, Beatrix; Kill Bill Vol. 2
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