You'd be surprised how many scammers there are out there. Being a Private Investigator I get to see the less obvious stuff, too.

Those 'Bank of Uganda' style scams as we call them, have been doing the rounds for some time. But what might surprise you even more, is that leaks are made as to the reasons intentionally. This is to pull you into a false sense of security. For example, Sam reads that they are intentionally bad to weed out all but the rubes. But look at it another way, which might not be so obvious at first glance. After reading such a thing, someone needing the cash bad enough, will try to scam the scammers, thinking they have the upper hand in the matter by pretending to be dumb. I can tell you it hardly ever pays off for those trying to scam the scammers. The scammers nearly always win no matter what society in general would have you believe.

I know of at least three scammers on these forums alone, thankfully all now banned from here, they used to haunt these and other forums on a regular basis. The member 'Visionist', who we codenamed 'Bluebottle' and cautioned over five years ago, was a professional stalker, blackmailer etc. The member 'Aramaxus', who we codenamed 'Danger Mouse' and caught around the same time, was part of an extortion racket. The member 'Pumeco', a charmer we codenamed 'Silk Tongue' and cautioned a few days back, has his very own darknet-based mafia of sorts. An interesting thing about Aramaxus was his method, and his hacking skills. He would use a single, constantly changing handle to hide his practices. I know some serious hackers who to this day, still have no clue as to how he managed to work some of the stuff he pulled off.

Then you have the 'trust' scams as we call them, which appear to be the most common right now. These are where your trust is gained. You are then put in a position of responsibility, and the scam is pulled. There is always a reason you become the one responsible for any 'damages' they shall seek. That, right there, is the scam in a nutshell. The scam that Sam has encountered in his email, would technically be considered a hybrid of the two.

Now I could tell people to stay away from scams, but the truth of the matter is, even the smartest of us are easy pickings for some of the scammers out there. I've never been scammed myself, but I'm quite prepared to accept that it's only a matter of time until it happens.