It's usually referred to by this term as, when the original emails appeared,
they seemed to originate from Nigeria.
Then it got drifty, and they appeared from almost everywhere That Had
Problems.
I really do find it fascinating, in many ways.
Bottom line is that you have to be braindead to fall for it.
But less nice is that it's an appeal to greed and illegality.
There's an Edgar Wallace Sanders-of-the-River story that's relevant here ...
Commissioner Sanders is on furlough in London, when someone tries to sell
him a Gold Brick.
Sanders grabs the guy by the neck and drags him to the nearest police
station and accuses him of IDB.
Natch, the brick is lead-plated-with-gold-leaf.
So Sanders was a right idiot to take the con seriously, but at least he had
the decency to react as a citizen rather than a greedy troll.
Robin
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