What is the "Nigerian prince" scam, and why does it still work?
The "Nigerian prince" letter has a cousin from the 1830s: a casket of gold and diamonds, and a stranger asking for a favour.
▶ Start the storyThe "Nigerian prince" scam is a kind of fraud: the victim is promised a large sum of money in return for a small upfront payment, supposedly needed to release the fortune. If the victim pays, the fraudster either invents more and more fees or simply disappears. The FBI describes it as paying money in anticipation of something of greater value and then receiving little or nothing. It is also called a 419 scam, after the section of the Nigerian Criminal Code dealing with fraud, although such scams mainly originate in other countries.
The idea is much older than email. The Spanish Prisoner scam of the late 18th century told businessmen that a person connected to a wealthy family needed to be smuggled out of a prison in Spain, with a share of the money promised for a small sum to bribe the guards. A letter from around 1830 begins by saying the reader will "doubtlessly be astonished" to hear from a stranger, and then talks of a casket holding 16,000 francs in gold and a 's diamonds. Email significantly lowered the cost of sending the old letter, and millions of messages can now be sent every day.
It still works because it only needs a few people to answer. Most recipients do not respond, but a small percentage do, which is enough. The promised money never exists. And the pressure is partly self-applied: once victims have paid toward the payoff, they feel they have a in seeing the deal through. In its annual report for 2025, the FBI's Internet Crime Complaint Center recorded 7,762 complaints of fraud, with reported losses of $155,910,852.
$155.9 million
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Recap
The big payoff never exists; the only real money is the stream of "fees" the victim sends.
💡 A trick to remember it · A treasure chest with a lock only you can open, and the key always costs one more payment.
Surprising fact · Letters with the same plot were already circulating in the 1830s, and the Spanish Prisoner version goes back to the late 18th century.
Sources (1)
No source, no claim. Every fact in this lesson (18 claims) cites at least one of these.