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January 16, 2012

Bank of America is frequently abused by crooks who try to gain a level of credibility in perpetrating their scams. The following is a slight variation on a frequent 419 (advance-fee) scam:

Subject: NOTIFICATION OF CREDIT FROM BANK OF AMERICA

NOTIFICATION OF CREDIT FROM BANK OF AMERICA.

Attn: Beneficiary,

We received a payment credit instruction from the Federal Government of Nigeria to credit your account with your full Inheritance fund of US$10.3Million from the Nigerian reserve account with our bank, Bank of America on 23rd of December, 2011.

However, you shall required to provide the followings data’s below:

{1}. Your Full Name and Address.
{2}. Your Confidential Tel, Cell and Fax.
{3). Your Bank name and address.
{4). Your A/c Name and A/c Numbers.:
(5). Your Swift Code / Routing Numbers.

Please do provide the above information accurately, because this office cannot afford to be held liable for any wrong transfer of funds or liability of funds credited into a ghost account.

Thanks for banking with Bank of America while we looking forward to serving you with the best of our service.


Thanks and God bless you.

Regards,

I omitted the full signature section because it's where the fun really begins:

So, I'm supposed to believe that Ben Bernanke is an account office at the Athens, GA branch of BofA, while also being Chairman of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. Notice, however, that this is Ben M. Bernanke. The middle initial of the real Ben Bernanke is S. He's also the Chairman of the whole Federal Reserve. And something tells me that Ben S and Ben M are not identical twins with only distinguishing middle names.

Anyone who takes this email as genuine and responds needs some adult supervision. Seriously.