An American Lion

Nigerian Internet Cafe

Until someone figures out that the Internet needs to be completely disconnected from the country of Nigeria, this kind of thing is going to keep happening:

Internet con artists appear to be targeting victims of Bernard Madoff.

The Securities Investor Protection Corporation warned Tuesday that someone had set up a bogus Web sitein an attempt to trick Madoff victims into turning over confidential financial information.

The site mimics the legitimate one set up by the agency and purports to belong to the International Securities Investor Protection Corporation. It offers victims a chance to apply for $1.3 billion in cash recovered from a Madoff “hideout.”

The group claims to be based in Geneva, but records show the site to be registered to an address in Lagos, Nigeria.

I don’t think any of Madoff’s victims should get their money back. The only reason why they were investing with him in the first place was to get their unrealistic returns back on their investments; everyone knew he was running a Ponzi scheme. No one thought they would be left holding the bag. The whole Madoff thing will go down as the biggest criminal enterprise in the history of investing and the wrong people are in jail. Madoff doesn’t belong in jail. Madoff belongs in the office of a prosecutor, helping to identify each and every client who deserves to be prosecuted for helping him build out the pyramid of lies.

And, yes, I do think they should just snip the cable that runs the Internet in and out of Nigeria. If they can’t control this problem, why bother letting them on the Internet? Snip that cable and they may go somewhere else, but, for a few days at least, the amount of SPAM on the Internet would drop almost immediately. That has to be worth something, right?