In the late s and early s, "Nigerian Prince" emails became infamous — typically involving someone claiming to be royalty and asking for money that they promised would be paid here with a hefty commission ghana once the purported royal offspring came into his inheritance.

Most people know by now that these outlandish claims are a scam.

The closers

But as internet connectivity became cheaper and more accessible on the African continent, those scams have morphed into something far more sophisticated, and much harder to recognize. I have traveled with a CBS News team to Ghana fairly often, and every time we've visited, we'd hear about so-called romance scams. For more than ghana year, CBS News has been investigating the devastating toll that overseas-based scams are taking on Americans of all ages and background. And that number, experts say, is almost certainly an undercount.

Over that period, CBS News has tried to understand what — and who — is driving the criminal activity, but scammers have been unwilling to talk. Why would any ghana willingly share the ghana of their trade, after all?

What’s the context?

And make no mistake — while many young Ghanaians are lured into potentially lucrative lives of cyber fraud, they quickly become tools of transnational criminal syndicates that work in what's become a billion-dollar industry. But earlier this year, the CBS News team dating to peel back the veil of secrecy on one of the criminal enterprises targeting unsuspecting Americans in the perceived safety of their own homes.

A CBS News photographer went undercover to film inside a so-called "boiler room" in a dusty part of Ghana's capital Accra, where young men work for a syndicate boss who provides them with laptops, phones, internet and stable electricity. They work late scams the night, trawling here dating sites for lonely, older victims they cynically refer to as "clients. Eventually we convinced a junior member of one of the operations to talk "scams" us on the condition we hid his identity.

He claimed he didn't do it much anymore, although the evidence we saw suggested it was pretty much his full-time job. In order to persuade him to speak to us, we agreed to conceal his identity, referring to him only as Abdullah. He has a wife and kids who know nothing about his double life. He told us he mainly targets American men, as they're easier to trick. Women, he said, take a lot longer to fall in love.

He poses dating a beautiful woman living in the U. His victims on garcia onlyfans other end of the dating appson the other side of the world, have no idea they're actually talking to a this web page man in Ghana. He builds trust by sending "flowers and chocolate" after convincing his victims to provide an karolyusetty onlyfans. If you're, like, in California, we have to set our time and everything… California time.

Abdullah and those like him in the boiler rooms are fairly low down in the criminal hierarchy. Most syndicates have "closers" who step in once a victim is on the hook. The closers are often well-educated young men who speak English well.

Sakawa Boys: Meet Ghana's online romance scammers

At first they were skittish and reluctant to talk. The two men who finally agreed to speak to CBS News — a dating boss who called himself Voodu and senior operator who went by Cola not their real names — said they only agreed to talk because their "motives are misunderstood. Although they were accompanied by an "enforcer" who glared at us throughout the interview and threatened that his, "boys will hunt you down," if we revealed their identities.

Voodu said he has been in the game for nearly 15 years, and he claims to employ around 50 people. He even tried to charm us, styling himself as some kind of Robin Hood. It's very difficult for people to get money," he told us. We have no idea if Voodu has actually tried to help his community, but he's certainly living the good life.

He claimed he would leave the scams of crime once he's made enough money to start his own business. He acknowledged that his work in the meantime does harm many other people, and said, "sometimes, I feel bad.

Cola said he's a university graduate who didn't have enough money to pay his school fees, and then after he'd qualified as a teacher, scams find a job. We asked him how he felt about making a living by stealing money from others. It's a mixed feeling," he said. I can do better than this. But you know, there's no sympathy, because once you go on the sympathetic side, you go hungry. Because sometimes I need to push people to the limit to get something from them," he said, adding that for many young men in his position, "if this game had not come, they'd have to pull the trigger on people and steal from them.

They may not be putting a gun to people's heads, but their criminal actions are still devastating for victims left broken-hearted and financially ruined.

He said his team in the boiler room begins by sending a victim little tokens of affection; chocolates, a source bear, even ordering their favorite food online and having it delivered to their doorstep. They shower them with attention, messaging them constantly and making them feel loved, adored and special. When a victim insists on a video call, Voodu said he hires online porn actors and records them acting out scenarios he directs — from the mundane to the more raunchy.

If a victim gets suspicious, Voodu is ready. He showed CBS News how he uses an image of one of his recruited porn actors to forge an image of an American passport as proof of identity. If the victim demands an in-person visit, they arrange for a meetup with a woman dating gets a cut of the profits. The set-up often centers around Ghana's globally renowned goldmines, the largest in Africa. The scammer, still posing as the woman the victim has come to trust, will claim to be in line to inherit one of these mines.

The victim is invited to invest in the mine with the promise of huge returns that will ensure a wonderful future for the happy couple. He described their main targets: "Male. Caucasian male. The Ghanaian scammers we have spoken with told us they prefer targeting men as they're easier to trap and less likely to report it, because of their scams over being conned.

Among the victims is a year-old American radiologist who we're identifying only as John. He declined to give an interview for precisely that reason — he's ashamed of having fallen into the trap. Kpangkpari told us that John believed he was in love with an Australian woman named Grace Erskine who lived in dating U. He was actually talking to year-old syndicate boss Alfred Kwame Ayivor, posing as Grace.

Ayivor controlled the entire scam, which dating the extreme measure of hiring a woman to play the dating of Grace for any in-person meetings John insisted on. Below is part of a text message exchange between Ghana and the woman he hired:. Woman: What's my cut? Without me, everyone gets nothing. I could always call him [John] and say it was a scam. She clearly did not follow up on the threat. Pretending to be Grace, she visited John in the U. She claimed she'd inherited a Ghanaian gold mine, which John was offered a stake in to secure their future together.

To seal the deal, the couple were to meet again, in Ghana's capital city, as organized by Ayivor:. Ayivor: That's where we stand with John, one week in Ghana with Grace. Woman: Yuck.

Ghana's underground "boiler rooms"

He's so gross. John did travel to Ghana and stayed for some of the time at the same hotel as Grace in Accra. Ayivor posed as their driver the entire time, apparently to keep an eye on an operation he hoped would yield a big payday.

Kpangkpari said the "exchange of information" between his team and U. Ayivor was arrested in and his assets were seized, but he died of an unknown illness before facing trial. As for the mysterious blonde woman who posed as Grace — she had vanished after her contacts with John.

When confronted, she kept her mouth shut and her head down, refusing to confirm or deny the allegations. Silk has not been charged with any crimes. She remains a person of interest for the Ghanaian authorities. The "Yahoo boys" of the boiler rooms and ghana so-called hustle kingdoms scams been glamorized in popular West African culture, perhaps unsurprising given the millions they claim to be raking in. When asked if their victims go into debt because of what they do, Voodu laughed and said, "yeah.

They live a flashy lifestyle — complete with expensive clubs, beach parties and fancy cars. We filmed one group celebrating a big payout by just throwing money in the air. Given that they lie and cheat for a living, I put it to the group bluntly: How I could be sure they weren't lying to us in the interview? Cola responded with annoyance: "I don't lie and cheat for a living. I'm using what I have here [pointing to his scams to survive. I decided to be honest to you.

Grinding poverty

In a country where poverty is rife and jobs are scarce, there's a long line of kids ripe for recruitment into a life of crime. Once they've tasted the good life, they seldom turn back — regardless of the cost to victims an ocean away. Edward R.

Murrow and Scripps Howard awards are among the many ghana Patta has received for her work. An inside look at an dating romance scam. Debora Patta. Twitter Instagram. More from CBS News. Why southern border towns are frustrated by scams immigration debate. Many North Ghana students return to class for first time since Helene.

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