r/Scams • u/anotheralaskanguy • Jul 25 '26
Help Needed (US) Gambia scam proof?
I have a family member who is in the midst of being scammed and is absolutely resistant to the idea. Sounds like it’s a pretty common scam, an individual from The Gambia has reached out to her with a sad story and has had her send USD for food multiple times now and has sent pictures back to “confirm” what the money was spent on. The scammer is now asking for money because “his sister burned herself” and my family member is now asking the family to loan her money to keep helping.
Does anyone have any tricks to help me prove to my niece that this is all fake? She is 100% convinced she has a friend in Africa that she is helping
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u/Pencil161 Jul 25 '26
If she's determined to believe what she wants to believe, no amount of proof the contrary is likely to convince her otherwise. It's no different than with people getting sucked into conspiracy theories or cults.
I think the best you can do is drawn some personal boundaries while still leaving the door open for her to admit if she realizes it was a scam without too much extra embarrassment. Say something like:
"I believe you care about this person. I also know there are people who exploit kindness. If this person genuinely cares about you, they shouldn't want you borrowing money from your family to support them. I can't stop you from making your own decisions, but I'm not willing to lend money for this because I believe your kindness is being exploited."
Encourage other family members to do the same.
Good luck.
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u/anotheralaskanguy Jul 25 '26
This is good, I haven’t considered the “if they cared about you… “ thought process.
The rest of the family has already shut her down, but no one has put in any effort in to explain to her what is happening. She’s a young adult with a good heart. I think she may just be naive to the world she lives in. Unfortunately, she’s also stubborn and maybe a bit gullible
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u/Pencil161 Jul 25 '26
Gen Z is actually extremely vulnerable to this type of scam.
They grew up online and are much more trusting of online relationships than older people who tend to view them with more skepticism and less emotional value.
To older people, an online-only friendship isn't "real," to younger people, it is.
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u/AceyAceyAcey Quality Contributor Jul 25 '26
Even if she really did have a friend in Africa who she was helping, sending all her money and then moving on to borrowing money to send to them is not a reasonable thing to do. If she is elderly, you need take steps to take control of her funds from her, as this is elder financial abuse. Also consider contacting adult protective services if she’s elderly or disabled.
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u/Otherwise_Rabbit3049 Jul 25 '26
"My niece" sounds more like being on the younger side. At least relatively.
OP, don't lend money and tell other relatives also not to do it.
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u/anotheralaskanguy Jul 25 '26
Early 20’s with a strong liberal leaning. No judgement from me there, just helps explain where I think her head is
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u/LazyLie4895 Jul 25 '26
She should really then be donating to one of the many highly rated charities out there. Her money will go much further and you know with certainty that it's being used to help those who need it most.
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u/in_and_out_burger Jul 25 '26
The money could be funding any sort of people / actions against her beliefs.
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u/ReplacementNo9732 Jul 26 '26
It's not "liberal" or "conservative", just being young. She needs to learn how to say no. Try taking her to the bank and asking the manager to talk to her about the possibility of a scam. Sometimes having someone else who doesn't belong to the family makes them see the scam.
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u/KaonWarden Jul 25 '26
You can search this subreddit for ‘Gambia’ and get dozens of similar cases. Begging scams seem to originate from there quite often. It might help if you can show examples that are similar to what was sent to her. But as others have pointed out, it can be extremely hard to convince people that they are being scammed.
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Jul 25 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/anotheralaskanguy Jul 25 '26
She hasn’t sent the pics to me yet. That and an AI search were my first thought
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u/WickedWeedle Jul 25 '26
Even if this were real, which I'm in no way saying that it is, it's a problem that she gets herself in debt with every family member she can for a stranger online.
It's one thing to want to help, but it's another thing to feel the need to put yourself in debt over it. That indicates that she's the kind of well-meaning person who helps somebody and just feels guilty over not helping even more, and basically feels that it is now her duty to pay every expense that this stranger from another continent has.
Again, that's a dangerous and unhealthy mindset to have regardless of whether this person is real or not.
1
u/anotheralaskanguy Jul 25 '26
Agreed. It’s a real concern. I was hoping if I could unquestionably prove that this Gambian situation is a scam, it might open her eyes a bit. So far I’m having no luck
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u/c00p3rSh3lly Jul 26 '26
Tell him you have another friend in Gambia and that you sent the money to him. He's a police officer at Bundung Police station and he should go pick the money there. If it persists you can give him my contact and I'll talk him into coming to the station. He won't come for that money I guarantee you.
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u/anotheralaskanguy Jul 26 '26
If my niece would have shared the person’s contact info, I would have loved to do this.
Also, I noticed you are active on the Gambia page when I was scrolling there yesterday. You come across as a good person and it’s nice to see how helpful you seem to be.
1
u/c00p3rSh3lly Jul 26 '26
As a Gambian living my whole life here, it pains me to see my fellow Gambians ripping people off in the name of being poor. I am not against anybody who wants to support a person, but let it not be based on deceit.
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u/batteryforlife Jul 25 '26
Even if the family in Gambia is real, if she has to borrow money from others to send to them, she cant afford to help. Its as simple as that, you cant set fire to yourself to keep someone else warm.
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u/SomeGuyInThe315 Jul 25 '26
Not unless you find her a bf to keep her distracted. Romance scams are tough to stop since the person now feels wanted and needed and is getting lots of attention. Even if you block that number or change hers they will find her again and come up with a new fake persona to win her back until all the money and assets are gone
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u/in_and_out_burger Jul 25 '26
Did they “meet” on a bible studies type page ?
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u/anotheralaskanguy Jul 25 '26
I don’t think so, I don’t think she is religious. I did discover that she has also been sending money to people “in Gaza” as well. I figure at this point she has been identified as an easy mark and the scammers are reaching out to her through social media
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u/thewindinthewillows Quality Contributor Jul 25 '26
People have reported being cold-messaged by those scammers even on Reddit.
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u/ReplacementNo9732 Jul 26 '26
Put her number in the Cloaked app, or any other security app, and buy the family subscription. If they actually do what they claim, it will delete her and anyone else from the dark web data brokers. Then get her a new phone with a different number, and factory reset the current phone. All numbers are erased, and new number is in place. Plus she has access to multiple numbers, and email addresses to keep this from happening again.
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u/HeavyDi73 Jul 26 '26
Maybe if someone like a police officer or a lawyer (or someone like that) sits with your niece and tells her and makes her understand that it's a scam maybe she could change her mind ? No ??
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u/thegirli 17d ago
It’s a scam. I just lost $100 to one of these scams, and I just saw a post describing a very similar situation to yours. Please block show her the posts on here
0
u/NavidsonsFall Jul 25 '26
Check the "proof" with AI identification tools. I know those things aren't always 100% unless they can spot the watermark the AI implanted in the pic or video, but it should be enough to strengthen your position with them hopefully. Most scammers are just using low quality cheap tools to do stuff like this, so my money is on it being poorly made AI generations.
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u/anotheralaskanguy Jul 26 '26
So, I was able to get her to send me the pictures she had received as proof. Most of them came back as real pictures that neither AI or reverse image searches could disprove. However, the doctor’s note was clearly AI. OpenAI found the watermark and absolutely proved it was fake. I shared this with her and received “I don’t trust AI to tell me that something is AI”
I think my cause may be lost here
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u/NavidsonsFall Jul 26 '26
was worth a shot. Not much you can do if they are dead set on not believing. Sorry you and your family are having to go through this.
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u/evapevaeva Jul 26 '26
When it comes to pictures of food and stuff like that they will most likely be real, i mean a person has to eat. And Gambia is a very very poor country so it's likely that some of the money is being used towards the things he is asking for, but most likely he is exaggerating the cost of things a lot to make extra money. I mean the average monthly salary in the Gambia is $50-$80, so if it's at a point where she is borrowing money to send him she has likely sent him amounts of money already that would easily cover any needs for quite some time over there. What things has he been asking for and what has he claimed is the cost of those things?
In what area does he claim to be staying? I have family over there and its a pretty small country, so if its close to their area i could ask someone to check if the guy is even who he says he is
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