Internet scammers in PNG keeping victims at bay silently

The internet scamming trend is phenomenon in PNG whereby innocent and uninformed citizens are victimized. Rather the internet scamming trend is rife now with the access to internet by anyone with a smartphone. Hence, anyone can be scammed into or lied by anyone over the internet with the combination of advancing technology. 

The rapid changes in the internet technology is  happening without any form of awareness towards the users in PNG about the problems and consequences. This is my personal effort to make the communities and people in PNG aware of the existence of internet scammers. It is rampant in some parts of African countries but now the idea has spread all over the globe and PNG is not exception to having internet scammer. 

At some stage, the PNG scammers using the technology and internet platforms are sending random Congratulatory messages to mobile phone users about their phone numbers randomly selected for certain promotions and to claim the prices, the recipient have to email/call/text the sender immediately.

There are phone numbers and email addresses provided in the message which are not related to the organization they refer to in their message.

Without having the courtesy to check for facts and other relevant details, some people have gone so wild after receiving the messages and made direct contact with the senders of the messages immediately. The senders of the messages were actually scams. They would advice you to pay some certain fees before collecting your price. That does not happen anywhere in the world where a promotional winner is allowed to pay any certain fees.  

Regardless of how it works with promotional winning claims, the unaware victims are paying the amount through either Post Office (SMK) or doing direct bank deposits and Western Union transfer. The winner expects the price redemption to be expedited soon towards his possession sooner after the first payment.

However, the agent (scam) intentional delays with several fees more fees  requested or at times switches off their phones to keep the victims under suspense. When the victims tries to contact the companies where the price originates from; they receive surprising responses with nonexistence of such promotions in their companies. 

It happened to my sister one time in Mt. Hagen in 2012. I accompanied her to the town and she drove directly to the Digicel Shop and bought a K50.00 Flex Card. She entered the numbers quickly and send it off to someone whom I do not know and she do not know as well. Then she called up the recipient and said, ''I already sent you the K50.00 Flex Card and I'm at the Digicel Office in Mt. Hagen, can I pickup my price here''.

I heard her talking and when she finished, I asked her, 'who was that; 'she said, the Digicel agent send me the congratulatory messages to my phone that I won K50 000.00 from the randomly selected numbers from Digicel Promotion. I was asked to collect the cheque in the office. To do that; the agents needed K50.00 Flex Card.  

I explained to her the existence of the scams in PNG and she should not have to give in easily like that, she should have checked for the details properly to see if such promotions have been advertised by Digicel PNG. 

To be honest, the rapid changes in the internet and having access on the smartphones is having a catastrophic impact in the lives of the people in PNG. It seems like, anyone can believe anything on the internet and believe into it without have any due consideration of the sources. There are news or promotional driven messages on the internet and mobile phone messages have scammers behind it. 

The scamming trend has gone from email to Facebook Inbox and then onto Whatsapp and IMO messenger and text messages. The scammers are really smart and can play around with people that will tend to know nothing of the existence of scam to ensure you are scammed. 

Many vulnerable people have lost their money in the process of receiving a promised Fortune, a Treasure Box , Million Dollars Transfer or to claim a Won Promotion on their phones. 

It is better to think that none of such like treasure box, million dollars transfer and uninformed promotional winning do exists in the world and it is ; purely work of the internet scammers. 

In whatever ways the messages were sent to you, it is for the best interest of yourself to; 

i. Confirm the sources of the messages or promotion to be 100% true and relevant

ii. To know their office location and get their specific details to confirm with other people

iii. Do not be too quick to pay any fees anytime soon event if requested persistently

The screenshot messages below are shared to me by Lorraine in Lae after viewing my first story I did to create awareness on the existence of the scam in PNG. 

It is terrifying for me to see the laws and requirements being mentioned and described by the scammer to Lorraine. Such laws and rules does not exists in PNG and a logical thinking would have prevented her from depositing or paying the second fees again. 

I was told that, their (scammer's) phone is off on the voicemail but so active on Whatsapp and IMO. It is assumed that, the scammers have diverted the voice-calls to voicemail intentionally and active on Apps which is appears to me as a smart idea. 

The screenshots of the message to Lorraine from the scammers based in Port Moresby by the name of Cassandra Wakia and some of her/his colleagues who are into this scam business.

This scam case has been reported to Lae Police Station and it is now a police case to investigate and bring these kind of people to face law and learn their lesson. 

Please be vigilant and do not give into such scam messages too quickly. Use your #SmartBrains and not #Smartphones.

This is uncommon in the logistical operations 

Payment was deposited into the nominated BSP Account with details

Clearly scammed into more money 

Samples of scammed packages 

Do scammers exist on internet?

Be smart and use your smart brains and not your smartphones

In this article I will briefly discuss the internet and mobile phone scamming trend that is rampant over the technological world and sounds genuine fortune or good luck towards anyone through social media Inbox but it does not exist as one thinks. It is costly to get involve for Nothing is Free in the business world. To understand the context of the internet scams better, please read through the article and some of the cases presented. 

Many of the unsuspecting man and women plus the vulnerable youths have been scammed into this trend and became victim by loosing valuables and money or shared their personal information with scammers which were used to manipulate their operations. Some of them lost most of their savings and hard earned income whilst others have loans with the hope of financing the promised treasures on transit to their homes.  

My personal experience (Case #1)
I came to learn and know the uses of internet with hands-on experience in 2015 at the university. With access to internet, I had my email accounts on Gmail and Yahoo engines opened together with Facebook account.

It was extremely exciting moment for me and I have to send emails to those people whom I have had their business cards and others from my notebook to reconfirm my email accounts. I got replies on real time with attachments of information I needed. The internet made my life at the university so easy and I started to browse any websites I wanted to know. 

On the other hand, with Facebook I could invite anyone and post anything anytime without even knowing the pros and cons that exists. I did not knew that my privacy was violated and bragging seems to be opposite of my real life at some stages. I gave a break to myself with Facebook. 

At one stage, I got an email from a very pretty lady in Ghana, South Africa. In her email, she said that; her father used to own a gold mine but due to a civil war in the area, her father was killed and mine was taken over by the enemy and she was taking refuge at a military camp. 

Her father's fortune were under her name as next of kin but she could not get it due to the fact that she was living in a military camp. She has to go into exile in order to claim her father's savings and investments. Hence, she needed a friend to contact some banks and important people in the investment sectors associated to her late father so that the funds can be transferred to me as the partner (trustee) in PNG. Even-though this sound new and strange to me, my excitement was more than I could ever imagine in my life. This deal seemed a lifetime luck and opportunity for me. I was already dreaming into what to get and what business to start with the fortunes coming my way. 

As days went by, we communicated consistently and she supplied me all the necessary documents electronically via email and everything appeared genuine and true with me.

I was curious but believed in her and kept every of the information to myself. Then, I followed all her instructions to contact the agents and investment companies relating to her late father's business links. In the process, I supplied all my personal details like; bank accounts, passport and others which would have been used by scammers to scam other people or if I happened to have lot of money in the bank account by that time then Im sure, I would have lost it all in the process to scammers.

To make the story short, after the communications were completed for the transfer of funds to me, she asked me to pay $1000.00 as a service fee to the bank via Western Union. At that time I had no money and the amount was too big for me as a student and mentioned to her that Im unable to pay the service fees. 

The tone of the communication changed and interests in the communication dropped unlike consistently. From thereon,  I knew it was not genuine luck for me and I was thinking again to get advice from some people to see if such business or luck do exists. 

I insisted on Western Union payments and tried to locate the bank details of the finance agent on the internet which required the service fee but could not locate it anywhere on the internet. I drew my own conclusion and block her off my contact lists - It was an internet scam.  

To my own understanding, there's nothing of such financial institutions exists anywhere in the world. I knew that the the transaction involving such billions of dollars will never be transferred to any banks in PNG easily with email exchanges. In fact, such transactions involving millions of dollars into PNG needs coordination with Central Bank of PNG which most ordinary people in PNG don't know yet (I guess). Such million dollars money will never enter PNG easily and secretly.

Case #2
From similar settings to case one, a pretty lady in one of the states in South Africa again emailed me saying; she had a treasure box full or billions of dollars from her family business that she wants to bring over to PNG due to a civil unrest in the area which was affecting her inherited family business. From the treasure box, she promised to give me 50% share of it, if I will help her process and coordinate the shipment of the treasure box to PNG.

She also promised to marry me and sent me her sexy photos which made me go so high on feelings every day/night and nearly gave up my studies too. I lost focus on other stuff in my life and concentrated on email exchanges with her from time to time for almost three months.

To make the story short, she asked me to pay for the agency fee that will take the treasure box to Indonesia in a week then to PNG. She said to expect a call from Indonesia on a given date. I waited and then my one bang Nokia on Bmobile rang and that Indonesian scam agent spoke to me genuinely and confirmed the shipment on transit from Africa. That person asked for trans-shipment fee of £1000.00 euro asap via Western Union. I was shocked with receiving international calls for the first time on my mobile phone. That phone call alone made me believe that the  treasure box was on transit and I was convinced to do the payment soon as possible but I have no money.  

I nearly borrowed or loaned that amount to pay for the shipment of the treasure box but it made me think again; there was nothing of such treasure box with millions of dollars transfer exists in the world and such cash shipment has never happened in my life or never heard of it.

With a bold statement, I replied her last email; ''Please, just bring anything and everything at your own cost to PNG and I will help you liaise with government and businesses for investment. After my email, there was no responses  and it all ended there. It was a good experience to know and understand the operations and existence of  the internet scams. 

Case #3
See the screenshot attachment. That person asked me to convert $1000.00 USD to PNG to pay for the clearance fee on some stuff coming from England which a friend was sending through. I asked to know if they were related in any work or anyone whom she met before. She denied and insisted many times to letting me know and later she admitted that;  they  met over the Facebook and a very nice friend to her and her family in PNG. My suspicion was right and I saved that person from loosing the big amount of money to the scam. 

Case #4
A friend of mine in Lae was asking me to help pay for the clearance fee of a Box in POM. That box was coming from Europe and have some expensive lady's stuff inside. I asked for consignment number and details to verify the details but that never happened because he insisted to provide me details. Out of frustration, that person said to fly over to POM and check the package for himself and he left me out of the discussion. Goodluck!

Case #5
There was someone by the name of Lydia in Buka paid for transshipment fee of K1000.00 of a box containing ladies stuff from Europe sent for her by her Facebook friends. The box must have arrived in POM and a customs agent in POM asked for another K1000. 00 clearance fee. At that point, she asked me to help pay for the clearance and she will repay after selling her stuff from the package. 

I asked for details of the box and there wasn't any shipment information like the consignment number.

That frustrated her and she left me out of the communication for assistance and said: if you wanted to help me out then pay the agent for the clearance and she provided a name of a male with BSP banking details. 

That agent (guy) already took the first K1000. 00 from her on the transshipment fee which was deposited directly into his BSP account provided. Again another K1000 for clearance was for customs clearance. (Such business transactions never exists in the logistics industry). I told her it was scam but she insisted and she said to pay for herself. I asked for the consignment details of the package but she never did. Goodluck!

Case #6
I have posted this message on all the social web-pages and blogs I managed and it saved some people from the similar scams that are existing in PNG as well.
Berdshiba is from Manus and she was aware of my messages on the Facebook about the existence of internet scams. 
She got the messages from some unknown phone numbers informing her of a parcel under her name in Port Moresby that was awaiting customs clearance and need her to pay the clearance fee. 
If she does not pay the fees then she would be arrested for not paying the customs fees. 
See the attached Whatsapp messages below. 

This is irrational and illogical to understand in business context but those scammers knows how to prey on the vulnerable and innocent people because that is what they have been doing to earn their living.   

There is not much awareness done on existence of internet and mobile phone scammers that exists. The responsible individuals, financial institutions and others need to create awareness platforms on this to safeguard our vulnerable people in the communities who have been exposed to the mobile phone and internet scam. 

The Bank of PNG is responsible for monetary policies and regulation mechanisms. As the responsible agency, the BPNG have issued several public notices like this on on the link;  https://www.bankpng.gov.pg/public-notice-on-email-scam/ . However, such information from BPNG is reaching only few people or its an intentional ignorance by many and keep falling prey for the internet and mobile phone scammers.  

Lessons learnt

• Nothing in this world that involves business is never free and its not free.
• No one will send your fortunes and treasures cheaply from anywhere in the world, Never!
• Such scammers have a networking worldwide and now it has links into PNG.
• For a parcel or box to arrive in PNG, the sender pays for everything on transit to PNG and if required, you as the receiver will pay clearance fee at the nearest Post Office, TNT /DHL upon collection and not in POM to anyone or agent.
• Do not pay clearance fee to any individual or agency, please confirm your consignment number (connote) with the carrier (Post PNG, TNT or DHL) before doing any payment.
• Ask the sender of the box or parcel to provide the consignment (connote) number of the carrier/parcel and track it online whilst on transit.
• There are so many online consignment tracking portals for free and please use them.  
• Please note that:, scammers are real and they do exist. Many have fallen victims and living in silence with agony and many more of such cases of mine or others outlines above exists whereby they lost money to scammers but I never lost any money and Im here to provide awareness on the lessons learnt.

Be smart and use your smart brains and not your smart phones, 
Never let your fingers and eyes  make decisions on such scams - Use your smart Brains.
Remember: Nothing is Free

By: raonraonpng media

Photos: Examples of scammed messages being screenshot by Berdshiba from Manus