Many scammers are using Western Union and similar types of electronic transfer services to carry out their crimes against innocent victims, but why? What is it about these services that make it so beneficial for those with criminal intentions?
Simply stated, scammers use Western Union because there is a lack of checks and balances in the money wiring business as a whole. It is extremely easy for a crime to be carried out using a wire transfer, for the following reasons.
Western Union Scams Are Speedy
When you send a wire transfer, the money is picked up on the other end extremely fast. Unless the victim intentionally creates a diversion that will slow down the process such as setting up a security question that the scammer will not know offhand, the money is processed and made available on the other end in a very short period of time.
Even when the victim is an American or Canadian sending large amounts of money to a foreign country, it is almost always already picked up by the time the victim realizes they have been scammed.
Identification Is Hard To Track With Western Union
Most scammers have access to various fake IDs and they use them to pick up Western Union transfers under fictitious names. This makes it almost impossible for a victim to track them down and prove that they carried out the crime, since the victim never learns their real name.
These fake IDs are extremely hard to detect from real forms of ID, so there is little employees of the wire transfer service can do about this occurrence. If one fake name is found out, the scammer simply purchases another ID in another name to continue their crimes. Often, one scammer will have various IDs that they use for different victims simultaneously.
Lack of Recourse
Once the scammer receives the money at their local Western Union location, they are successful. Eventually, the victim will realize what has occurred but it will be too late. There is absolutely nothing they can do to prove the crime occurred or who was on the other end of it. In some cases, criminal investigations into the fake names used to send the money turn up to be stolen identities from yet another victim that knew nothing of the crime.
Western Union does not guarantee any of their transactions nor do they return money that was scammed from a victim. They simply warn their customers to never send money to someone they do not personally know.
This is actually good advice that can prevent a lot of the fraudulent transactions that go through Western Union every day, but some scams will still occur. For instance, victims of romance crimes often feel they do know their scammers. They feel they know them on a very intimate level and this suggestion from Western Union does not apply to them.
Obviously, fast wire transfers are the easiest and most convenient method for scammers to receive cash from their victims and go on undetected and completely unidentifiable.
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Thank you for posting this. Western Union does have a great deal of information about scams in their FAQ:
http://www.westernunion.com/info/faqSecurity.asp?country=global
People just need to read them – and sites like yours!
I agree, Western Union does have a lot of info on their site, but if a person is going to wire money they may not go to the website . . . but they will go to an actual store location. This is why the warning signs need to be where people will see them . . . in all store locations.
Shawn Mosch
Co-Founder of ScamVictimsUnited.com
Find us on Twitter, Facebook and more with
http://www.retaggr.com/page/ShawnMosch
As too much people ,for example ,about 300 000 people in China share the name Li Qiang ,so once the some people crook you in China ,can never catch hold of them again ,there are a large population in China as you know ,so be care once you deciede to wire MONEY.
I will add some tidbits to sending money via wire transfer by Western Union, which these scammers desire you to do. The fastest way to lose money is by wire transfer for the money you send can never be recovered once it is paid out for the receiver is rarely caught.No matter if it is a lottery sweepstake, a rare item at a cheap price, or a Nigerian or some other official looking email from any foreign land once you wire transfer money, It is Gone. Once you give out your bank account information you just might lose all the money in your account as well. There is no money from a foreign country just a shyster trying to mine your bank account. In my book ‘Scammers Among Us Beware’, which you can view on Amazon.com, there are over there are over 10 questions you Must ask yourself first before you send any money. If you do not get a satisfying answer to your concerns, then walk away. Do not send there scammers money.It will be gone and you will be out your bankroll, remember that. Thank you.