Yahoo-Yahoo Years: Nigerian fraud culture is coming full circle
Last week, Dubai authorities released a viral video of the arrest of Nigerian Instagram influencer, Raymon Olorunwa Abbas also known as HushPuppi.
Popularly known for his irreverent pop-culture iconoclasm, cars, luxury homes, and extravagant lifestyle, Hushpuppi has long claimed to be a successful real estate developer. The source of his seemingly endless reserve of wealth has also been trailed by several speculations for almost as long as he’s been famous. Many hinted fraud others pointed to a few equally illicit activities but these speculations remained nothing more than mere chatter. Until recently.
Before the arrest, Hushpuppi and his gang were responsible for scams amounting to over $400 million accrued from scamming over 2 million victims. The notoriety of the scams instigated by Hushpuppi and his gang are so wide-spread that their arrest needed collaborative inputs of enforcement authorities from the FBI and Interpol. Along with the Dubai Police, the three agencies led a sting operation dubbed “Fox Hunt 2”.
Advance-fee scams are also commonly referred to as the “Nigerian Scam”, dating as far back as the early 90s. During the regime of former Nigerian military head of state, Ibrahim Babangida regime, oil prices crashed, the economy sank and huge salary cuts were made to military officials as well as civil servants. The harrowing unemployment and poverty that ensued gave way to the fraud era. “Some of these guys came out and started perpetrating fraud,” Andrew Apter, an Africa historian at U.C.L.A told The New York Times. “They used the language, insignias and letterhead of financial offices to lure people in.”
Fast forward to the dawn of the digital age; cybercafes became popular establishments in Nigeria, the medium for many scammers, switched from handwritten letters and telefax to emails. The promise of quick and easy wealth allowed fraudsters from the postal era draw in a newer generation into fraud rings, known as ‘workshop’ in street slang. Together, the veterans and their younger recruits established a renewed version of the 19th century Spanish Prisoner scam which is now largely known as the “Nigerian Prince” Scam or “419” (after the section of the Nigerian Criminal Code which criminalises fraud).
Easier access to larger groups of victims, evolved these scams from an internet scourge, to what would become one of the most distinctive phenomenons of the 21st century. The technique, however, has remained unchanged; suspects either participate in long-game dating scams or offer victims near-unbelievable deals, that would first require, parting with a much smaller sum.
In Hollywood movies, best-selling novels, and TV series, the trope of the troubled “Nigerian Prince” who baits victims with the promise of cutting them a percentage of a business deal has been referenced countless times. One of the most fascinating takeaways from this phenomenon is how many finance experts from around the world, struggle to understand how the amateurish nature of this classic scam hasn’t deterred it from ensnaring unsuspecting victims.
In spite of a sustained global crackdown on fraud in recent years, what many have long-presumed to be an activity of the criminal underworld, has become more brazen. Hushpuppi’s arrest is landmark news today due to his near-celebrity clout, but last December, Obinwanne Okeke (largely known as Invictus Obi), another scammer, was apprehended by FBI agents while trying to return to Nigeria, after a visit to the United States. Two weeks ago, Okeke pleaded guilty to wire fraud amounting to $11 million.
Though a lesser-known ‘mysteriously wealthy big man’ than Hushpuppi, a big difference between how the two operate, is Okeke’s well-polished professional profile. In addition to being touted as a Nigerian businessman, he was also an intermittent Forbes contributor who was listed as one of Africa’s most successful 30 under 30 entrepreneurs back in 2016.
Okeke is one of many signals of the alarming scale of fraud culture in Nigeria because scammers are becoming increasingly adaptive. Last year, Quartz Africa reported that in the first half of 2019 alone, the FBI received over 14000 reports of business email compromise (BEC), another evolved medium of the email scam. The BEC technique involves scammers hacking or compromising emails of legitimate American businesses through phishing links or malware. The data they gain access to will be used to redirect payments for those establishments to their own accounts. This was uncovered during a big-bust of nearly 80 suspects, who were indicted for fraud and money laundering offences amounting to $46 million (₦17 billion)
An enabling environment for fraudsters to openly thrive in Nigeria is a bigger causal factor. In Nigerian Afropop for example, themes of Yahoo-Yahoo, are akin to the drug-dealing references you’d hear in American gangster rap. “Yahooze” a 2007 lead single off an album of the same name, by rapper and Afropop veteran, Olu Maintain, was one of the first mainstream Nigerian pop songs with Yahoo-Yahoo innuendos. Since then, the references have gotten more brazen, and the lifestyle itself, amplified by social media.
In an article titled “Dancing to the beat of 419”, a Nigerian culture journalist, alleges the Nigerian music industry had been infiltrated by con-men looking to clean their loot by investing in music. “Because of the nature of the [music] business, it is impossible to quantify exactly how much of the Nigerian music industry is being funded by cybercrime, but it is a significant chunk,” he wrote for Mail and Guardian.
Notably, in the last two years, a conversation has been the clash of value systems between Nigerians who believe 419 scams are illegal, and those that disagree. At the height of these debates, controversial Nigerian rapper, Naira Marley was once quoted to have said: “If you know about slavery, you’ll know that yahoo is not a crime”. His statement was met with instant backlash, but the sentiment that advance-fee fraud is a form of reparations for slavery and colonisation is not lost on many pro-419 adherents.
It’s also not rare to find law-abiding Nigerians who empathise with Yahoo boys, on grounds of the conditions that led them to crime. In a country where poverty is often weaponized and money speaks louder than integrity, it breeds the perfect ecosystem for the worst possible outcomes. While Yahoo-Yahoo thrives on a wider, socially-engineered glorification of wealth and greed, the real harm is to the global perception of hardworking Nigerians, locally and internationally.
A number of online payment services like PayPal are unavailable in the country, due to how they have been deployed for impropriety in the past. Advance-fee scams are also the reason remote workers in Nigeria often resort to VPNs in order to avoid exposing their actual location. Within the country, Nigeria’s Economic Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) and Special Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS), are known for arresting innocent young men and women with laptops as potential suspects. What should be a mandate for proper investigation and collaboration with international law enforcement agencies, has repeatedly been reduced to witch-hunting ploys for extortion and police brutality.
Nigerians reeling in the Dubai Police’ arrest of Hushpuppi in high definition video, amidst reports of gendered violence and protests for black rights, means the BEC bubble is reaching peak expansion. Most potential fraud suspects will most likely be dissuaded from using it until perhaps, another scam technique takes its place. Or maybe in a couple of years, a Netflix or HBO special will explore the phenomenon as a consequence of government failures in education, job creation and infrastructural development. In the meantime, hope is that more 419ers can be brought to the book like Hushpuppi was. If there’s anything Nigerians love more than a rich man with unexplained wealth, it’s premium entertainment from their messy scandals.
Ify Obi is a culture writer whose work has been featured in Teen Vogue, OkayAfrica, Quartz Japan + more. Tweet at her @ifyobi_