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Good on him to do this. In my younger days I used to seek out scammers and give them a big run around. But in my case they had no US presence and reporting them to Spanish police was useless.
One of the common scams goes like this: The perp stakes out an online auction (say eBay) for who has missed on a high price item (e.g. a laptop). He then messages you and says that he has an identical or better item at about half the price, but he is not authorized to sell it in the US. He is willing to trust you and mail the item. You can pay him once you receive and inspect it. But to be sure that you operate in good faith, he wants you to send him the money via Western Union and put a password on it. After you are satisfied with the merchandise, you can send him the password so he can retrieve the money.
The problem is that is not the purpose of a password. The purpose of the password is to help a stranded person without id be able to prove too WU they are the intended recipient and get their money. For example if your friend has his luggage and purse stolen and is stranded without an id, she can call you and you will send her money with a password that you will tell her.
However, once you send someone the money, the person can show id and claim it. So in this case, the scammer would run to the WU office with their valid id and claim the money.
In your example, the two parties enter into an agreement. And I guess I don't understand. Are you saying that the trade of $$ for the laptop would be an illegal transaction because the seller is unauthorized to sell in the US? Because of his status, would the fact it was facilitated by WU, create a case of fraud?
I am not personally worried about getting caught up in a scam...I'm probably one of the most skeptical people on the planet. But I do have a neighbor that has been caught up in a scam twice in the last year, and she doesn't seem capable of learning not to trust out of the blue texts, calls or phishing online. She goes to dozens of unknown websites to shop, and hasn't lost any money yet, but for some reason she can't understand why this is happening to her?
Yes, the scam is that you send a password "protected" money in his name to show your good faith, and he will send you the laptop. After you inspect the laptop and validate that all is good, the claim goes, you will email him the password so he can collect his money.
Except that the password does not prevent him from collecting the money. He will show up at the Western Union with an ID and take the money without the password.
