‘I’m Sister Maria. Please help me’: A lexical study of 4-1-9 international advance fee fraud email communications

@article{Onyebadi2012ImSM,
  title={‘I’m Sister Maria. Please help me’: A lexical study of 4-1-9 international advance fee fraud email communications},
  author={Uche Onyebadi and Jiwoo Park},
  journal={International Communication Gazette},
  year={2012},
  volume={74},
  pages={181 - 199}
}
4-1-9 is a multi-billion-dollar international email scam that is believed to have originated from Nigeria. This study examines the framing of email communications used in this fraud and content-analyzes their lexical features. Findings indicate that the scammers used Realism as the main persuasive lexical characteristic in the messages, that is, language that suggests meeting tangible needs in people’s everyday lives. The scammers also framed their messages as ‘business’ proposals to disguise… Expand
View on SAGE
11 Citations
Highly Influential Citations
2
Background Citations
5
Methods Citations
2

Tables from this paper

11 Citations

Citation Type

Citation Type

You can trust me: a multimethod analysis of the Nigerian email scam
How do scammers invoke trust within the Nigerian email scam and how do recipients interpret such trust-laden offers? Rather than view the email content as static, this article suggests that the… Expand
Detecting advance fee fraud emails using self-referential pronouns: A preliminary analysis
TLDR
It is found that the incidence of first person singular pronouns is seven times greater in 419 emails than non-419 emails and elements of a future research agenda can build on the preliminary results to help reduce advanced fee fraud. Expand
Fraud and Fairy Tales: Storytelling and Linguistic Indexicals in Scam E-mails
Most of us receive numerous spam e-mails, texts that in one or the other way try to convince us to engage in the transaction of enormous sums of money, promising enormous benefits. In reality, such… Expand
“You are in Trouble!”: A Discursive Psychological Analysis of Threatening Language in Chinese Cellphone Fraud Interactions
  • Jinshi Chen
  • Medicine
  • International journal for the semiotics of law = Revue internationale de semiotique juridique
  • 2020
TLDR
Conversation analysis is applied to discuss fraudsters’ threatening language in Chinese cellphone fraud conversations to provide references for preventing cellphone fraud and fighting against fraudster’ threats and bullies. Expand
Understanding Nigerian e-mail scams: A computational content analysis approach
TLDR
An in-depth analysis of e-mail contents with a mixed-method approach using machine-learning-based content analysis and qualitative analysis suggests some scammers resend a message with the same story as before but with highly textual differences to avoid spam blockers. Expand
The gift of the gab: Are rental scammers skilled at the art of persuasion?
TLDR
This analysis indicates that Cialdini`s marketing-based social persuasion strategies, such as liking, appeal to authority, and the need for commitment and consistency are extensively implemented by rental scammers. Expand
Advance fee frauds messages – non‐declining trend
Purpose – This paper aims to present some intake on advance fee frauds. Frauds of which frequency of occurrence, despite being long present and people are globally aware of them, still present great… Expand
When hip-hop meets CMC: digital discourse in Nigerian hip-hop
TLDR
It is noted that the cross re-territorialization of CMC in Hip-hop was explicated thematically through depictions of internet crime, romance and the necessity to be successful regardless of prevailing challenges. Expand
Veracity assessment: aspects of the account, the source and the judge that influence judgements of plausibility
Decades of deception detection research have revealed that people are poor lie detectors in general, hovering at chance level (Bond, C. F., & DePaulo, B. M., 2006). As well as generating considerable… Expand
The Use of Military Profiles in Romance Fraud Schemes
ABSTRACT Romance fraud occurs when offenders use the guise of a genuine relationship to defraud a victim, typically via online communications. Research has focused on the general structure of romance… Expand
...
1
2
...

References

SHOWING 1-10 OF 55 REFERENCES
A Qualitative Analysis of Advance Fee Fraud E-mail Schemes
Criminals utilize the Internet to perpetrate all manner of fraud, with the largest dollar losses attributed to advance fee fraud e-mail messages. These messages come from individuals who claim to… Expand
Nigeria Tackles Advance Fee Fraud
TLDR
Advance fee fraud did not start with the Internet, although the Internet enables the criminals to reach a greater number of potential victims more quickly and economically, and sometimes without being traced. Expand
The 419 scam: information warfare on the spam front and a proposal for local filtering
TLDR
Ad hoc information warfare has begun in which anti-scammers hijack these websites as well as scammers' email accounts, which could suppress that portion of the fraud carried out by email, at least in the short term. Expand
Advance fee fraud on the Internet: Nigeria's regulatory response
TLDR
How the international community might help to tackle Internet scam crime is highlighted and a case for greater systemic transparency, legal enforcement readiness, intensification of public enlightenment campaigns and technological approaches to combat the menace of advance fee fraud on the Internet is made. Expand
An analysis of advance fee fraud on the internet
Purpose – Advance fee fraud on the internet is a current epidemic that rakes in hundreds of millions of dollars per year. The advent of the internet and proliferation of its use in the 1990s makes it… Expand
Cascading Activation: Contesting the White House's Frame After 9/11
President Bush's initial frame for the attacks of September 11, 2001, overwhelmingly dominated the news. Using that frame as a springboard, this article advances a coherent conception of framing… Expand
Is anyone responsible? How television frames political issues.
A disturbingly cautionary tale, "Is Anyone Responsible?" anchors with powerful evidence suspicions about the way in which television has impoverished political discourse in the United States and at… Expand
Verbal Certainty in American Politics: An Overview and Extension
One of the most important questions about political leadership is also one of the oldest: How strong must a leader be? For many, the answer is simple: A leader must be the strongest person on the… Expand
Charting the language of leadership: a methodological investigation of President Bush and the crisis of 9/11.
TLDR
The authors illustrate the process of computerized content analysis and many of its strengths and limitations, with the hope of facilitating future leadership research that uses this approach to explore important contextual and symbolic elements of the leadership relationship. Expand
Fraud as economic terrorism: the efficacy of the Nigerian Economic and Financial Crimes Commission
Discusses Nigeria’s efforts, especially through its Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), to meet the requirements of the global Financial Action Task Force on money laundering and other… Expand
...
1
2
3
4
5
...