Dynadot

advice I was scammed and its embarrassing

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I cant believe I am writing this.

I am doing this knowing I will be ridiculed.

I am doing this knowing some people will laugh.

I am doing this knowing some people with be outright nasty

I am not looking for sympathy.

I am doing this to help others.


It started a couple of weeks ago. I posted on Linkedin that I was selling my name MineCryrpto.com and BitcoinPrices.io for 1 million dollars. Sometimes I like to try odd ways of advertising to see if it works. I wanted to see if posting an obviously inflated price would prompt some discussion. Apparently it caught the eye of a Nigerian scammer and I would be his next victim.


Barbara wrote to me about the name technology.com:

http://www.richarddynas.com/pics/



I was intrigued so I did some research and couldn’t find the domain name or address with any recent action. The name popped up on linked : https://www.linkedin.com/in/barbara-untergasser-893193144/

She belonged to some domain groups and had a bunch of connections. It wasn’t a brand new account so I proceeded to write Barbara. I asked her how much she wanted - $120,000. I didn’t have that kind of money so I turned to a trusted person I know in the industry to buy the name and pay me a finders fee. We have done that deal before so I knew I could at least a few bucks off the deal.If I could get the price down, I could make more money. Barbara seemed niave and had no idea what she had. I asked if she would take less and we agreed on a price. I explained to Barbara that I had a financial backer and I needed to loop him in, he would handle the deal from here. I loop my backer in and he asks for her escrow information,Barabara writes me back and explains that her husband messed up their escrow account years ago and she cant use escrow. I go back to my backer and let him know the situation and he bails immediately. “Hell no! It’s a scam” I was advised to run. I wrote back to Barbara and advised her that nobody in the industry will touch her name without escrow. I thanked her for her time and went about my way.


I left work for the day and on my way home I received an email from Barabara. She wanted to do a deal and would sell it for less because she couldn’t use escrow. After days of chatting through Linkedin she explained she was from Austria and moved to Texas after she married:

http://www.richarddynas.com/pics/

Her husband ended up turning to drugs and they are divorcing and selling off assets. She needed money to live and their domain portfolio was the only thing worth much money.

We talked for a week, we talked about personal things,domains and everything in between. I was checking stories and looking for clues the entire time. She would have bailed long ago if she was scamming me – right?

I asked for proof about owning the name and she provided it:

http://www.richarddynas.com/pics/

I told her that I wasn’t going to transfer money until she transferred the name. We agreed on a small down payment and then the transfer would start. The money exchange would be Paypal. I sent the money to her friend because she didn’t have paypal (another red flag) – I sent the down payment. The transfer started:


http://www.richarddynas.com/pics/


I wired the rest of the money and sent another small amount via Western Union to a friend she owed money to. (Another Red Flag)


I waited for the push to my enom account and nothing. I called enom and they told me the name was registered under them but managed by another party? I called the number they gave me and emailed the account. I still have never heard back from them. I started getting nervous and pressuring Barbara. All of the sudden I get a phone call from her “son” asked me to relax that I was upsetting his mom. He had a heavy accent. I knew at that point I was screwed!


I didn’t want “Barbara” to know I was on to what was happening. I kept talking to her. I was scrambling trying to cancel everything.


1. Western Union – it was already picked up. Im screwed. I filed a report and I still havnt heard anything back – that money is gone.

2. Wire – Bank Of America and USAA. I called them both before they opened to stop the transfer. My bank USAA – told me its instant, its at Bank Of America, call them. I called and talked to so many people who would do nothing. Literally nothing. The bank wasn’t open yet, they could have stopped it. They wouldn’t do a thing. I have since written to the heads of these banks and their management and have heard nothing. How can you not listen to a person who is explaining an outright scam and do nothing?

3. Paypal – what a joke! I paid by friends and family by accident. I wasn’t paying attention, my fault. They froze 2K on his account, I paid 6K. Again, they could have stopped this. I explained what happened and how it was a scam and I could prove it, they didn’t care only to tell me tough, you used friends and family. They still have 2K frozen and wont give it back to me. I even send all the proof to their executive support and their answer was to dispute it with my credit card company. With all the business I give Paypal I was expecting better support.

I tried stopping all of this before business hours and before money was taken, all of these businesses could have stopped the transactions at least to investigate. Nope, not one of them cared.


Enom wrote me back:



The email about the transfer and owning the name were forged. Damn it. It looked real. I started following IP addresses and one hit Nigeria, now I knew I was in trouble



I wrote to Barbara and confronted “her” and I found out it was a scam. It was a guy, he wont tell me where he is from but I know. To this day he still texts me telling me he is sorry.

I found the guy to where I wired the money. He is a Nigerian student at Baylor University. He made the mistake of friending me on Facebook. I went to Baylor and the Waco police to pressure him. I also start bothering his family. He wired back all my money . I never heard from Baylor so I wrote them again, they went to the Waco police because I was harassing them! They never once acknowledged my emails or told me to stop. How do I know the crime wasn’t committed on their computer system?


Here is all the information I have on all of them:

Barbara Untergasser
[email protected]
[email protected]
Oriade Ayemo
Gbemileke Ikugbanmire


Telephone numbers:

737-210-3686 – “Barbaras son”

346-233-0321 – “Barbara” known as Barbie88 on Namepros

217-577-8729 – [email protected] – piece of shit in Atlanta that has my 6K – claims he doesn’t know anything



Bank Name: Bank Of America Account Name: Oriade Ayemo Account Number: 004644944793 Routine No: 026009593 Address: 1100 N valley Mills Dr, Waco , Texas 76710 Who is this to you? Bank Name: Bank Of America Account Name: Emmanuel Akintola Account Number: 334055137079 Routing number: 061000052 Address: 4567 S cobb Dr SE, Smyrna, GA 30080



Bank Name: Bank Of America Account Name: Emmanuel Akintola Account Number: 334055137079 Routing number: 061000052 Address: 4567 S cobb Dr SE, Smyrna, GA 30080 Note: Do not use business as the payment type to avoid delay. Just use Family or Personal.

Western Union Details Name: Voke Emekeme Location: Atlanta, GA Amount: $2000 Western Union Details Name: Akpevwe Olidge Location: Atlanta, GA Moneygram Details


Name: Voke Emekeme Location: Atlanta, GA

[email protected]

Recipient Name: Akpevwe Olidge Destination: Atlanta GA.

If you have any questions please feel free to ask. This went on for 2 weeks and he still texts me!
 

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The views expressed on this page by users and staff are their own, not those of NamePros.
@uglydork - I'm sorry if I missed this part somewhere. But at what point did you get you money back? And how did that go down? By which I mean who paid you and how was the payment made?
I traced the guy to whom I wired the bulk of the money. He is a Nigerian student at Baylor in Waco Texas. I friended him on Facebook and he accepted before he realized who I was. I also friended his sister in Nigeria. I called and emailed Baylor and the Waco police and told him. I also found out he had a pregnant girlfriend using Google and finding their baby registry.
I started to pressure him and his sister. I told him I went to Baylor and Waco police. I asked him if he could support his new child if he was kicked out of college? He insisted someone sent him the money to buy a car - I asked why I would send him money for a car? He finally felt like he may lose his education and get arrested so he wired the money back minus $30 for the wire fee because he said he was broke.
This guy might be the actual scammer - I have no idea? There are also 2 people in Atlanta involved. I still dont know who the real scammer is. We do text each other - its weird.
 
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There’s some bastards about, apologies for the language but you have to call them for what they are, they always pose under a woman’s name as well.
 
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@uglydork
Good you got most of your money back but you did know everything about this was wrong the moment you learned the payment was gonna be split out to quite a few 'accounts/ recipients', and the western union stuff should have made you tell the seller where to go!

Shame on the fraudster!
Thanks for sharing their details!
 
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So sorry to hear. Hope you'll get all your money back.

The easiest way to verify domain ownership is to ask them to change the nameservers from the existing ones that are already in use.

If they don't have access to the domain name, they can't do this.

Forging email addresses to send emails to make them look like as if they were originating from the particular domain name, is much easier for anyone who has access to a PHP enabled server, or with websites

The only way to verify the authenticity of an email address is to replying back and asking the sender to respond to your reply from the same address he/she contacted you. A scammer can use the above trick to create a fake "from" address, but he can't able to receive/read/respond to the incoming emails to the fake "from" address he used, because he doesn't have access to the real domain name and its email service. Even if he/she manages to hack a real email address under a domain name, you can always ask him/her to create and communicate via a new email address (of your choice) under the domain name to authenticate his ownership if you suspect something is fishy.

Thank you, I was looking for this answer only. This is scary, I can't imagine consequence if scammers use it for getting bank details. I used to verify email by simply looking its domain name, but from now I have to be more careful.

@uglydork
I can feel your pain, losing money like this really hurts. Thank you for sharing. I learned many things in this thread.
 
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I traced the guy to whom I wired the bulk of the money. He is a Nigerian student at Baylor in Waco Texas. I friended him on Facebook and he accepted before he realized who I was. I also friended his sister in Nigeria. I called and emailed Baylor and the Waco police and told him. I also found out he had a pregnant girlfriend using Google and finding their baby registry.
I started to pressure him and his sister. I told him I went to Baylor and Waco police. I asked him if he could support his new child if he was kicked out of college? He insisted someone sent him the money to buy a car - I asked why I would send him money for a car? He finally felt like he may lose his education and get arrested so he wired the money back minus $30 for the wire fee because he said he was broke.
This guy might be the actual scammer - I have no idea? There are also 2 people in Atlanta involved. I still dont know who the real scammer is. We do text each other - its weird.

If he was a poor broke student he would not have had the money to repay you. If he is not the actual scammer, he knows the scammer well enough (intimately?) to know how the scam operated and to get the scammer to repay the money to you. So your agreement with him must have been that you would not press charges against him or anyone else in the scam provided he refunded the money. Would that be correct? Did you have to put that in writing? If not. I'd put the cops on him and everyone else involved, for the balance owed. It sounds like a ring, to me.
 
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I traced the guy to whom I wired the bulk of the money. He is a Nigerian student at Baylor in Waco Texas. I friended him on Facebook and he accepted before he realized who I was. I also friended his sister in Nigeria. I called and emailed Baylor and the Waco police and told him. I also found out he had a pregnant girlfriend using Google and finding their baby registry.
I started to pressure him and his sister. I told him I went to Baylor and Waco police. I asked him if he could support his new child if he was kicked out of college? He insisted someone sent him the money to buy a car - I asked why I would send him money for a car? He finally felt like he may lose his education and get arrested so he wired the money back minus $30 for the wire fee because he said he was broke.
This guy might be the actual scammer - I have no idea? There are also 2 people in Atlanta involved. I still dont know who the real scammer is. We do text each other - its weird.
Why is this guy even in the Country? Maybe what is his name has a point, extreme vetting, sorry this happend, amazing comeback, one set for 60 minutes for sure that you actually got a scammer to wire you the money back. Wire fraud is no laughing matter, his student visa is basically up in smoke, you now hold this guy's life in your hands pretty much.
 
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If he was a poor broke student he would not have had the money to repay you. If he is not the actual scammer, he knows the scammer well enough (intimately?) to know how the scam operated and to get the scammer to repay the money to you. So your agreement with him must have been that you would not press charges against him or anyone else in the scam provided he refunded the money. Would that be correct? Did you have to put that in writing? If not. I'd put the cops on him and everyone else involved, for the balance owed. It sounds like a ring, to me.
I get a lot of spam, where it says multinational companies looking for someone to process payments, etc.. this could be a multi level scam where he keeps a % for accepting funds, I am surprised the money had not already reached it's given point of destination. Funny about the wire fee minus $30, I think you should advise BAC at least.
 
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If he was a poor broke student he would not have had the money to repay you. If he is not the actual scammer, he knows the scammer well enough (intimately?) to know how the scam operated and to get the scammer to repay the money to you. So your agreement with him must have been that you would not press charges against him or anyone else in the scam provided he refunded the money. Would that be correct? Did you have to put that in writing? If not. I'd put the cops on him and everyone else involved, for the balance owed. It sounds like a ring, to me.
Hell no! I didnt promise that asshole anything! The Waco police were kinda jerks. They told me I have to press charges here first. My family is heavy into law enforcement (Father-in-law in this town) so my wife told me just let it go. She doesn't want everyone in town talking about it.
 
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Sorry to hear this but with all due respect you should have at least done some basic research before going in on such a huge name.
  1. Domain has a huge BUY IT NOW option on top.
  2. After clicking it redirects to https://www.mydomaincontact.com/index.php?domain_name=technology.com .
  3. I understand that technology.com has WHOIS under privacy but mydomaincontact.com has a WHOIS that is public.
  4. You could have tried to contact them and asked because only a person with control of the domain can add such a redirect.
I am not a pro but can do some research here and there . Especially if amount is in $XXX,XXX .

Hope that this doesn't happen again with anyone.
 
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OH MY GOD ! This is really serious .. How the hell did spammer get access to this? :xf.eek::xf.eek::xf.eek:
An email can be sent from any email address, including [email protected]. I can send you an email from [email protected] in two seconds. The address that an email comes from is not guaranteed to be from them. It can be set to anything the sender wants with a couple seconds of typing. It's not impressive. It's not a feat.

It's worrisome how much trust is put in email by those who're oblivious to how it works.
 
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Sorry to hear about this.

I do hope that you eventually recover the remainder of your $$$$ from the ATL guy.

Thank you for sharing your experience so that the rest of us can learn.

Take courage.

(Btw, some of y'all need to learn that you don't 'beat a brother' while he's down. smh. )
 
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OH MY GOD ! This is really serious .. How the hell did spammer get access to this? :xf.eek::xf.eek::xf.eek:

It is surprisingly very easy to fake emails.
 
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An email can be sent from any email address, including [email protected]. I can send you an email from [email protected] in two seconds. The address that an email comes from is not guaranteed to be from them. It can be set to anything the sender wants with a couple seconds of typing. It's not impressive. It's not a feat.

It's worrisome how much trust is put in email by those who're oblivious to how it works.

Very true but when you respond back they would have had to use a different reply to address and that should also been a red flag.
 
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The scam is alive and well, caught a guy that posed on this forum doing the same thing TODAY.
 

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The scam is alive and well, caught a guy that posed on this forum doing the same thing TODAY.

OMG... deal.com

In case you don't take it

Where can I send my deposit to? :giggle:
 
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The scam is alive and well, caught a guy that posed on this forum doing the same thing TODAY.
I reported this guy to the to the mods about a week ago, looks like they banned him Feb 5th...

There was a few people in talks with him, he never backed up ownership, so talks went south very quickly.

https://www.namepros.com/threads/deal-com-70-000.1063692/

New scam of 2018 find a great domain behind privacy with no landing contact, and offer at a great wholesale price, I guess.

Domains must be a gold mine if the Nigerians are working this angle, once the word gets out more will come, making buyers even harder to deal with for legit buyers if people start getting ripped off, and warnings go out.
 
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I reported this guy to the to the mods about a week ago, they still didn't do nothing, WOW

There was a few people in talks with him, he never backed up ownership, so talks went south very quickly.

That type of stuff should be instant perma-ban.
 
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It's worrisome how much trust is put in email by those who're oblivious to how it works.
Thanks for the info! I didn't notice how easy it really is ! :xf.eek:(y)(y)
 
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419! Typical from Nigeria, Legos is the hub, internet cafes full with teams of scammers. There are people who go after these guys 419eater, thescambaiters etc.
 
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Hell no! I didnt promise that a*hole anything! The Waco police were kinda jerks. They told me I have to press charges here first. My family is heavy into law enforcement (Father-in-law in this town) so my wife told me just let it go. She doesn't want everyone in town talking about it.

Family pressure will get you to stop. Almost every time. I can understand how you and your wife can have different views on this same subject. How many more times would it have to happen before she would change her mind? (rhetorical question). Isn't it strange that being heavy into law enforcement in you town/city puts you in a weaker position? (another rhetorical question).

Hopefully you never fall for another scam again and have learnt your lesson, about being ultra-careful when large sums of money are involved. Heck. I'm that careful about making payments to a new person here on NP. If it's a big value, it goes thru Escrow. I'll pay the fees. If I've traded with them before, and they don't have any bad TR, I will pay first by paypal. (But oftentimes I don't buy domains if they have any bad PR. But in the right circumstances I could see myself overlooking my rule sometimes. Just like you did.). But we are talking quantums different in terms of values.

I would also like to thank you for your post. I'm sure you original target for posting your experience here has been met. More people are now aware of this scam and will not send money without using an Escrow service. Including me. Thank you again.
 
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Sounds like an experienced scammer without a conscience (well just a little)..
Whats scary is they were able to fake the ownership/documentation/emails.
At least you hit them where it hurts and got some back.

I remember I was contacted and I'd just come into some money, it made me so paranoid and so upset.
People like that can ruin anything good in a second. They think people grow it on trees, they don't care about who they hurt. It's really pathetic. (They should funding circle if they need enterprise funds!)
At least you have a good heart!

Thanks for sharing!
 
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Sorry for your loss.

What was the total agreed price in the end, before you started transferring the prepayment? Just curious.
 
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