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Globalization of trust and internet confidence emails

Bistra Nikiforova (Department of Arts and Communications, University of New England, Biddeford, Maine, USA)
Deborah W. Gregory (Department of Finance, Bentley University, Waltham, Massachusetts, USA)

Journal of Financial Crime

ISSN: 1359-0790

Article publication date: 7 October 2013

1269

Abstract

Purpose

This paper aims to analyze Nigerian Letter scam emails in the context of processes of globalization in order to understand how and why they continue to defraud people despite the increased public awareness.

Design/methodology/approach

This paper analyses over 500 emails received in an institutional email box over a nine-year period. Distinct rhetorical strategies for conveying trust and reputation were identified as indicators of the global connectedness of scammers and their victims.

Findings

Scammers from Third World countries and their First World victims share similar perceptions of trust and business reputation due to the global financial flows and transnational movement of people and labour, which is strengthened by the internet. They have transformed the rhetorical elements that establish trust and reputation within the Western rational context and imbued them with new value meanings intended to defraud their victims.

Originality/value

This paper is the first to interpret the success of Nigerian Letter scams as a product of processes that go beyond scammers' and their victims' social and political realities. It is valuable for crime-fighting organizations because it accounts not only for the rhetorical strategies used by the scammers but also for the underlying context that enables the spread and success of the online Confidence Letter scams.

Keywords

Citation

Nikiforova, B. and W. Gregory, D. (2013), "Globalization of trust and internet confidence emails", Journal of Financial Crime, Vol. 20 No. 4, pp. 393-405. https://doi.org/10.1108/JFC-05-2013-0038

Publisher

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Emerald Group Publishing Limited

Copyright © 2013, Emerald Group Publishing Limited

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