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Have you received countless emails saying they are from Nigeria or other African countries? Is the scenario of transferring money out of the country very familiar with you? If so, you have just experienced the popular Nigerian scams at work.

This act is also known as “Nigerian advance fee fraud”. Although its name has “Nigerian” in it, this fraud act spans through the globe and reaches far beyond.

Some people claiming to be from Nigeria will ask for your help in transferring money out of the country. This is the drama of a kind of Nigerian scam. Thousands of people all over the world, including doctors, lawyers engineers and professors, who have been targeted by what is sometimes called the “Nigerian letter scam” or “Nigerian advance fee fraud”. Although “Nigerian” is the name given to it, this scam is international. The letter or email you get may also pretend to come from another country.

It is actually estimated to have cost Australians $2.5 million each month. Nigerian scams can vary and the format, purpose and styles of their emails are also different.

So how do Nigerian scams work? The bait is usually sent through a letter, fax or email, stating a business proposal or transaction. The scammer pretends to be a person who needs help in transferring a large sum of money because of some family or political problems. You will then be offered a portion in exchange of your bank details.

If you get hooked on this, you will be faced with a line up of “advance fees” such as customs, legal fees and bribes. Then, if you still believe them, you have to wait for the wealth that will never come.

The only thing that happens is your account being robbed.

Nowadays, there are several other versions for Nigerian scams. One will request to use your bank account to deposit huge sum of money. This sum of money is claimed to be from a secret bank account, inheritance, government contract, or a “forgotten” money left in a bank. Whether you have paid or not, there will always be delays that prevent the sum from being deposited in your account.

You may encounter another version of Nigerian scams in the form of charity plead. The difference of the victims here from the victims in other versions is that here, victims do not seek anything in return. The scammers usually send emails to Church members in religious websites, forums, and chat rooms. All they say they need is some compassion and mercy for unfortunate people. They pretend to be running a charity which you can help by sending funds. These charities can be for the old, orphans and more.

So what can you do to prevent falling for Nigerian scams? Simply ignore and do not reply. Unknown email senders can mean that the message is a spam or a scam. You can throw the offer at once by deleting the email message in your inbox. However, you can also keep it as a reference in the future if you want to report such fraud acts. Keep your private information such as bank account number only to yourself.

If you feel like the offer is too good to be true, it’s most probably a lie.