African Representative for procurement wanted.

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Posted: Mon Jan 07, 2008 3:40 pm

The following Skype conversation just took place. I can't quite figure out what the scam is but it stank from the start.

The website www.stmei.com looks authentic but the telephone numbers on it are mobiles, and the Ghanaian telephone number is known to be associated with 419 fraud.

Xxxx is me, of course!

The guy's Skype ID is john.batts and he claims to be from Sarawak, Malaysia. (Maybe he bats both ways!)

The names of some of the people on the website appear to have been lifted from a Swiss company called Ismatec.

If this is a scam it's pretty slick and sophisticated. Any comments?

Quote:

[15:40:24] John Batts says: Dr John Batts from Malaysia
[15:40:31] John Batts says: And you/
[15:40:42] Xxxx says: good thanks what can i do for you?
[15:41:38] John Batts says: We are looking for an African representative
[15:48:51] Xxxx says: representative, as in .....?
[15:49:29] John Batts says: Visit our website first
[15:49:36] John Batts says: www.stmei.com
[15:52:17] Xxxx says: ok i had a quick look . This is representation as in Sales promotion I take it
[15:53:18] John Batts says: No
[15:53:22] John Batts says: That will come later
[15:53:40] John Batts says: There is a particular raw material we use in production. We have been lacking this raw material since because we lost our agent from where we used to buy before. Republic of Iraq because of the war there.
[15:53:53] John Batts says: We find out during the last international trade exhibition in London through London Chamber of Commerce that the material is available in Ghana Africa
[15:55:19] John Batts says: So we intend coming to Africa for the purchase of the material but London Chamber of commerce adviced us not come to Africa with out having a representative for us not to fall into the bad hands of the bad people in Africa as we hear a lot of stories about Africa and business malpractices
[15:55:55] Xxxx says: Ghanaians are good people and generally trustworthy.
[15:56:04] Xxxx says: obviously there are exceptions.
[15:56:21] John Batts says: Then read this and help us run the enquiries immediatelly

[15:57:32] John Batts says: From the Desk of Dr. John Batts
Distribution Sales Manager
Sylver Technological & Medical Industries
134 Jalan Kuchin Sarawak, Malaysia MY 85000
Tel; 0060146490037,0060162814430 Fax; 00603865321
Email; [email protected] Website; www.stmei.com
Private Tel. Malaysia; +882 164 665 0100
Private Tel. London; +44 703 174 0126,+44 702 409 8159,+44 702 409 7781
Private Email; [email protected], [email protected]

Attention; Sir/Madam

I am delighted to introduce to you that the above named company is a manufacturing company here in Malaysia. We manufacture computer accessories, focal glasses/lens, microchips and advance hospital equipment (AHE).

Presently, my company wishes to come down to Africa to procure a raw material and if possible site our annex office/industry in Africa ,to the nearness of raw materials as we were made to understand from the Chamber of Trade and Industry in London that Africans
are rich with mineral resources .

Our humble purpose of contacting you is to avoid my company not to fall into awful hands in Africa, as we haven't been to Africa before. Also frontier my company fairly prior to my company's proposed project in your country where you shall aid the process of incorporation and construction based on your good recommendation for a personally bilateral relationship
with you and my company.

We request you to avail our company the gesture of contacting this local miner�s in Ghana , Africa to enquire the availability and fair prices of their raw material on our behalf as they were recommended from the Economic desk of A High Commission here in London as a local miner's who deals on this mineral in industrial quantity as advertised by the company-
Reference: Page 9, of International Local Miners Brochure Africa 2005.

LOCAL MINNER/ SALES MANAGER � ENGR. JAMES HARRY
GHANA, WEST AFRICA.
TEL: - +233 244 875346

Please take note of our specification and price data;
RAW MATERIALS REQUIRED �ZAKOLINE SOLID MINERAL
DESCRIPTION -PURE WHITE IN COLOR
SIZE - LIKE SUGAR CUBE
INT¡¯L STANDARD SCALE - 1UNIT = 5 PIECES
INT¡¯L PRICE PER UNIT - US$2,800
QUANTITY REQUIRED - 2,000 UNITs X US$2,800

Please do contact ENGR. JAMES HARRY on the above telephone number for enquiry on our behalf to find out if he actually exists and if the material is available at the price we do buy perhaps you may not disclose to him that foreigners are coming for procurement otherwise they may reduce the ISS (International Standard Scale i.e. 5pieces = 1unit) and possibly increase their prices than International Standard Price (ISP).
Note: The directors have agreed unanimously that if we can get a fair arrangement we would legally endorse to pay you 10% commission of the total purchase and you should be informed of the continuity of this transaction because we �ill be buying the product three-month intervals for three good years.

Best regards.
Dr John Batts
Distribution Sales Manager
[16:00:33] Xxxx says: It's a scam
[16:01:13] John Batts says: No please
[16:01:42] John Batts says: Scam with website and reachable telephone numbers?
[16:02:59] Xxxx says: I don't know who's the scammer here but I can assure you that that this LOCAL MINNER/ SALES MANAGER � ENGR. JAMES HARRY
GHANA, WEST AFRICA.
TEL: - +233 244 875346
[16:03:02] Xxxx says: is a scammer
[16:04:40] John Batts says: No, the contact was given to us by London Chamber of commerce directly
[16:06:19] Xxxx says: look it's perfectly clear to me that either you are a scammer yourself, or you are incredibly naive. Your site looks fake too and I hae no time or interest in this type of crap beyond reporting it to the authorities and the company that hosts your website.
[16:06:42] Xxxx says: Good try, you might fool a lot of people but you can't fool me.
[16:07:28] John Batts says: Is that how scammers scam?
[16:07:36] John Batts says: Goodbye and good luck
[16:07:52] Xxxx says: you'll need the good luck pal ....unfortunately you picked the wrong guy because I investigate fraud and have many resources at my disposal to deal with vermin who try to scam the innocent

Posted: Mon Jan 07, 2008 3:53 pm

My guess would be that the 'company' would send you some checks to cover the purchase of the raw materials from the 'engineer' in Ghana. Fake cheques of course, cashed by you and forwarded no doubt by western union to the guyman in Ghana.

Baiting Guru Joined: 08 Jul 2004 Posts: 11857 Location: UK

Here is the Who-Is for the domain:

Quote:

SYLVER TECHNOLOGICAL AND MEDICAL INDUSTRIES
stmei.com (whois)
202.71.103.123, (reverse ip), ns88-web.malaysiahoster.com., EASTGATE

Domain Name: STMEI.COM
Registrar: DIRECT INFORMATION PVT LTD D/B/A PUBLICDOMAINREGISTRY.COM
Whois Server: whois.PublicDomainRegistry.com
Referral URL: http://www.PublicDomainRegistry.com
Name Server: NS88-WEB.MALAYSIAHOSTER.COM
Name Server: NS99-WEB.MALAYSIAHOSTER.COM
Status: ok
Updated Date: 22-nov-2007
Creation Date: 23-nov-2006
Expiration Date: 23-nov-2008

>>> Last update of whois database: Mon, 07 Jan 2008 16:08:32 UTC <<<

Registrant:
STMEI
Matthew Sunday ([email protected])
Jalan Cheras
Cheras
Wilayah Persekutuan Kuala Lumpur,50300
MY
Tel. +60.12456789

Creation Date: 23-Nov-2006
Expiration Date: 23-Nov-2008

Domain servers in listed order:
ns99-web.malaysiahoster.com
ns88-web.malaysiahoster.com

Administrative Contact:
STMEI
Matthew Sunday ([email protected])
Jalan Cheras
Cheras
Wilayah Persekutuan Kuala Lumpur,50300
MY
Tel. +60.12456789

Technical Contact:
STMEI
Matthew Sunday ([email protected])
Jalan Cheras
Cheras
Wilayah Persekutuan Kuala Lumpur,50300
MY
Tel. +60.12456789

Billing Contact:
STMEI
Matthew Sunday ([email protected])
Jalan Cheras
Cheras
Wilayah Persekutuan Kuala Lumpur,50300
MY
Tel. +60.12456789

Another example of the site in a scam email:

Quote:

Sylver Technological & Medical Industries
2-3-12, SHIN-YOKOHAMA
KOHOKU-KU, YOKOHAMA 222-0033
JAPAN and Malaysia
email:[email protected]
Web site: www.stmei.com
Telephone: +8821652072682
Attn:
My company manufacture care windscreen and computer screen.
We wish to procure some raw material from some where in West Africa and also site my industry in in one of the regions there .We request you become our African representative so that we can procure this material through you. I therefore request that you assist my company for the procurement of zakoline in Burkina Faso?/span>. I am happy to furnish you with my company抯 requirement.
RAW MATERIALS REQUIRED ?ZAKOLINE RAWMATERIALS
Description: PURE WHITE LIKE HALF OF SUGAR CUBE
INTL PRICE PER UNIT - 1 UNIT = 5 PIECES IS $3,500
QUANTITY REQUIRED ?2,000 UNIT X $3,500 PER 1 UNIT.
NAME OF LOCAL MINER: Engineer Tijani Baba
WEST POINT mining company
Tell: +226 788 102 22.
Please do contact Engr. Tijani Baba for the availability and the prices so that we can proceed to meet you to make the procurement if the raw material is available.

Thanking you in anticipation of your kind co-operation and quick response.
We shall give you 10% of the total transaction we make in Africa.

This is for your efforts and inconveniences.
Regards,
Dr Yon Takamora.

(MANAGING DIRECTOR.)

[edit]

falnsb wrote:

The website www.stmei.com looks authentic but the telephone numbers on it are mobiles, and the Ghanaian telephone number is known to be associated with 419 fraud.

I can't see the phone numbers on that site listed anywhere as being used by scammers, got a link?

Posted: Mon Jan 07, 2008 4:46 pm

The phone numbers of STMEI are on the site at :

http://stmei.com/Contact.htm

but the Ghanaian number is in the Skype text

Quote:

LOCAL MINNER/ SALES MANAGER � ENGR. JAMES HARRY
GHANA, WEST AFRICA.
TEL: - +233 244 875346

Baiting Guru Joined: 08 Jul 2004 Posts: 11857 Location: UK

Yeah I saw the numbers on the contact page, I thought you meant that the Ghana number was also on the website.

Posted: Thu Jan 10, 2008 7:22 am

A little more investigation shows me that the information on the website - which of course looked too professional to have been the scammers' work, was lifted, complete with names and photos, from various companies including Shell and a company in CH called Ismatec. I have contacted the companies concerned and both plan to take action.

Posted: Thu Jan 10, 2008 10:56 pm

SITE KILLED

www.stmei.com

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