Top Stories
UK and Romania bust ATM skimming gang; 18 searches, 2 arrested to date
Amnesty International visits 53 scam compounds in Cambodia; issues report; kidnappings, beating
Part Nine on Fraud gangs: Nigerian Black Axe. This “confraternatity” seems to have emerged from Nigerian college campuses. It goes not appear to be the only one that did. And now Black Axe operates worldwide. For example, Black Axe has partnered with the Italian mafia to control prostitution in Italy. The Black Axe has even had Facebook pages for chapters in major cities in (at least) North America, including Toronto, Houston, Atlanta and Washington DC. Though we do not tend to think of violent crime being involved in frauds, Police agencies investigating the organization state that it does engage in violence.
And in addition to its work with a wide variety of fraud around the world, it is also engaged in international drug dealing, sometimes using romance scam victims, for example, to carry seriously illegal drugs from country to country.
Scammers operate as a network. For example, just one Western Union location in London had thousands of complaints from victims who had been instructed to send their money to that location for a variety of scams. But how did the scammers know who was behind each transaction so that the proper fraudster could get paid? And what if that location were stealing part of that money? Of course there are scammers that rob each other. But since frauds cannot go to the police to enforce their agreements, it seems likely that Black Axe and other organized crime groups serve this function.
Next up: China
