A Philippines driver claims he has stolen a box full of valuables

Nov 19, 2013 15:08 GMT  ·  By

Another Typhoon Haiyan-themed 419 scam has started making the rounds. This time, the scammer claims to be a driver at a security company in the Philippines.

The man, Roola Quan, claims the typhoon hit just as he was transporting a box containing valuables worth $11.5 million (€8.5 million). He claims his security escorts were killed so he took the box to a colleague at another private security company.

The scammer says his company thinks everything was lost in the typhoon so now he’s asking people to help him transfer the money out of the country. Those willing to help him are promised “good money.”

As experts from Kaspersky highlight, the fraudsters have even placed a couple of links to BBC articles to make everything look more legitimate.

Those who respond to the emails will likely be asked for some money that’s presumably needed to complete the transfer of the valuables. Such crooks are known to have made hundreds of thousands and even millions of dollars from unsuspecting victims, so be careful if you come across such emails.

It’s likely that news of Typhoon Haiyan will continue to be leveraged by scammers and cybercriminals for quite some time.