Gullible Christians Target Of Internet Scams
By Lavinia Ngatoko in Challenge Weekly, New Zealand
Special to ASSIST News Service
AUCKLAND, NEW ZEALAND (ANS) -- Christians,
often seen as a soft touch, are being increasingly targeted by Internet
fraudsters.
Some
New Zealand Christians have reported receiving more than 10 offers of
money a week from overseas countries. Often those writing the emails
offer to share a percentage of a large sum of the money with those they
are writing to.
These sums of money, which in some cases are as high as $30 million,
have been offered by people who claim in many cases to be dying of
cancer or some other dreaded disease, and as Christians say they “would
like to do something worthwhile before they die.”
One such letter-writer, supposedly from Kuwait, claimed to be a new
Christian convert suffering from long-time cancer of the lungs. His
wealthy wife and only son were, he says, assassinated and although he
was to inherit all her money he did not have long to live.
He writes: “Our Lord almighty is in control of everything, so now I
have decided to divide part of our wealth by contributing to the
development of ‘evangelism’ in Africa, America, Europe and Asian
countries. I selected your church after visiting the website for this
purpose and prayed over it and I got your email ID through email online
in your church.”
He said he wanted to donate nearly $US20 million to the church/ministry
for evangelism as well as for the less privileged.
Making contact or expressing interest is the first mistake. If the
recipient falls for the ploy then the next step is that they are
usually asked for a nominal fee up front to release the funds.
Then there usually comes a snag, which requires more money being paid.
These payments in total could amount to anything between $50,000 and
$80,000.
There are also many variations on such emails. Another common one is
solicitors writing on behalf of their clients who have passed away
without leaving a will.
If you think these emails are too far-fetched to possibly be believed
by anybody in their right mind, then you are right.
One churchgoer in Tauranga, New Zealand, who would prefer not to be
named, mortgaged his house and spent $80,000 trying to secure millions
of dollars. He ended up getting in so deep he started begging others to
help him with just one more payment to get the money.
An Auckland pastor was ready to jump on a plane and fly off to the
United States in response to such an email, until one of his
parishioners advised against it.
Vision Network prayer coordinator John Fulford, who receives these
emails regularly, agrees that Christians can often be perceived as more
“trusting.”
Mr. Fulford said the thing was not to open them and certainly not to
respond to any.
“If you get sucked into the con then it can become like a gambling
addiction. You just keep giving money, because you hope you will
eventually get it back,” he said.
Tony Plews, executive director of Overseas Council of NZ said before
his ministry installed a spam filter he was getting three of these
emails a week. He still gets one or two a month.
“Just absolutely ignore them and never reply, even to say no thank you.
Because if you do then it just confirms that your email address is a
live one ...” he said.
Lee Chisholm, of the Internet safety group NetSafe, warned that “if
it’s too good to be true, it usually is.”
Ms. Chisholm said many Christians had heard long ago about the Nigerian
scams, but there had been many more since then.
“Often it’s a really touching story and many people are still being
taken in by these scams.”
She warned that some things to look out for were requests for personal
details such as back account numbers.
“Genuine places like banks would never ask for bank account details
online.”
Helpful websites are www.netsafe.org.nz
and www.consumeraffairs.govt.nz/scamwatch/
Watch Out!
The Ministry of Consumer Affairs in New Zealand lists some key telltale
signs that an offer could be a scam:
- They come out of the blue;
- They sound like a quick and easy way
to make money;
- You are told that there is almost no
effort or risk; and
- You are asked to give personal
information such as your banking details and scams sound just too good
to be true.
The ministry also warns people not to
believe
claims that it is approved by it or by the Commerce Commission since
both agencies do not approve or endorse schemes.
| Lavinia Ngatoko reports for
Challenge Weekly, New Zealand’s independent and non-denominational
Christian newspaper. |
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