The phenomenon of mafia has appeared online in
various forms. Some are flagrant and others not so insidious. To understand why
I liken it to the mafia, we must know what that organization is.
What is the mafia?
The mafia is a secret criminal organization engaged in
illegal activities such as blackmailing, gambling,
drug-dealing, protection and prostitution. A tightly
knit group of
trusted associates, the mafia is said to primarily practice protection
racketeering (the use of violent intimidation to manipulate local economic activity),
especially illicit trade. Being bonded together by a code of honour, in
particular the code of silence (or omertà
in southern Italy),
protects the Mafia from outside intrusion and the law.
Now, what has the mafia got to do with online
work?
While the
online mafia does not operate in exactly the same way as the offline one, there
are similarities in their modus operandi.
I would
call this online group the onfia and define it as a secret and often open criminal and sometimes seemingly legal group engaged
in illegal and mostly unethical activities such as
scamming, perjury, trickery, non-existent
client service, fraud, unscrupulousness, greed, double standards, self-importance or
bumptiousness, extortion and virus-propagation.
A tightly knit group
of trusted associates,
the online mafia primarily practices group business—the sharing
of sensitive information among themselves to manipulate working on the computer
and online business activity, especially affiliate or multi level marketing
work. Being bonded together by a code of alliance, in particular the code of mutual
sharing of business information first, this safeguards the onfia from outside competition.
I will use my
own experiences to explain these phenomena.
Scamming
The term scamming is slang for defrauding or swindling, and is
often used to describe fraudulent internet business schemes. This type of
trickery involves gaining someone else’s possessions or money under false pretences.
I started
my online work with brokerage activities back in the early nineties. I engaged
in the trading of petroleum products (crude oil, diesel, jet fuel, etc.),
fertilizer, rice, sugar, cement and other big boys’ commodities where one could
make huge commissions.
With the
aid of online portals such as alibaba, ec21, indiamart, etc., I looked for
suppliers and buyers of these products and put them in contact with each other.
I realized many people will tell you they had products to sell and even send
you POP (Proof of Products) documents which turn out to be non-existent or falsified.
This was especially true of Nigerian 419 princes with Bonny Light Crude Oil
offers.
Scamming
now has to do with the stealing of passwords and identity theft where hackers
steal credit card details and similar documents of online workers.
Alternatively
known as the Nigeria
scam, the schemers pretend that they have gained, inherited or have right to a
large amount of money and all they need are banking coordinates to deposit the
money with the recipient who is promised a big commission. Once the
unsuspecting victim agrees, they ask them for a small deposit to bribe bank
officials to have their cooperation for the transfer. If the person pays, they
come back and ask for a higher amount for officials of the Ministry of Finance
who must okay the transaction. Then for the Governor of the Central Bank, etc.,
until the victim is bled dry. See the 419 definition for additional information.
Perjury
If getting
a real product in my brokerage activity was a problem, finding genuine buyers
was another. People will present themselves as buyers and then tell all sorts
of stories when asked for POF (Proof of Funds).
In sales transactions,
POP should generally precede POF but you would find buyers who first accept
this principle and later claim the contrary.
Once I
proposed Nigerian Bonny Light Crude Oil to a Canadian refinery who found out
that the POP sent was real but the product had been sold long before. The CEO
threatened to sue me for perjury. I also threatened to sue the company for
contacting a third party for information on the product without my prior
knowledge, what was prohibited by the NCND (Non-Circumvention Non-Divulgation) agreement
we had signed. In fact, this was a bluff but it worked and saved me!
Trickery
There was a
case I found a real American supplier of rapeseed bio fuel who I put in contact
with an Asian buyer. Preliminary talks went well and even the buyer had
approved the sample. Then silence ensued from both sides. When I enquired, the buyer
said the seller couldn’t furnish POP and the seller said the buyer it was rather
the buyer who had no funds for the operation. I suspected both were using tricks
to avoid me getting a commission, especially when they cut off communication
with me.
You may
wonder why I didn’t safeguard my side? I had. With an NCND agreement. But with
parties I only knew online and so many miles away from me, how was I to know
what was really going on?
Non-existent customer service
Tired, I
switched over to blogging. An American company offered me training to create my
blog on blogger.com. One of their conditions of sales was after-sales service.
But when a problem cropped up and I needed solutions, they never answered my
queries. This was in stark contrast to before buying their product when all my
queries received prompt answers.
Fraud
From
blogging, I discovered affiliate networking. People are made to believe that
they only need to sign up and they would make money. Not having much time
because of my teaching job, this really appealed to me. I invested in many of
them (what online workers call one shiny object after the other) and only lost
money.
Linked to
these are gurus—people who create networks or teams and tell you to join and
receive the number of referrals to let you make money. You join their networks
and end up paying monthly dues and waiting and waiting in vain for your turn to
receive your downlines.
I realized that
people offering online affiliate networking work were more interested in using
newbies (new internet marketers) to build their networks (downlines) than in
helping them to succeed and make money.
Unscrupulousness
A similar
case to the above are dishonest uplines. I had one who asked me to participate
in coop advertising costs and other forms of promotion being organized by the
group leader. Surprised at not getting any leads, I contacted the leader only
to learn he didn’t know anything about those advertisement efforts.
Then came
teams. I joined a group which promised to fight against the above system by
first creating a team and when we had enough members all of us will join a
business and make money. Since I wouldn’t have to wait for downlines to make
money, this suggestion appealed to me.
Once we had
over one thousand members, the administrators brought in a business which many
of us eagerly joined. Then surfaced difficulties of signing in to our back
offices. The admins assured us the company was working hard to solve the
problem. Days passed and some impatient members left. Hard remarks began to
appear in the group room posts.
One day I
needed to contact the leader. To my stupefaction, he had removed himself from
the group and from Facebook. It was when I asked the second leader where the
first was that he realized what had happened. The second leader also
unceremoniously left the group which is still hanging there on Facebook.
However,
before disappearing into thin air, the first leader had added many of us to a
new group. Things were better here. Soon the admins introduced a business. The
top people—made up mainly of the administrators, their families and friends—started
making money. The rest of us waited and hoped and before we knew everything
stalled. Discontent set in among the members who expressed it in no uncertain
terms. Soon infighting broke out among the admins; then the group dislocated.
Most of the
admins left and created their own groups. Some of us followed those we trusted.
Everything was going fine. Then all of a sudden one of the leaders of a group
said she was the only one doing all the hard work and members were doing little
to nothing. This was true. But what most of us noticed was that she brought
this matter up only after our numbers and efforts had buoyed her business up
and now that she was making money she could afford to dump us. And this she
did, by asking everybody to promote their own links.
Something
similar happened in another leader’s group I had joined. The leader had assured
us that those participating in the group would receive top positions in the
business he would bring us. Assured, we worked hard to grow the team and create
awareness about it by posting in Facebook and other social sites. As soon as the
group went viral, the admin announced a good matrix program. It took some time
for some of us to receive links to sign up. It was when people started making
money we realized they had first enrolled themselves and their friends and
family members we never saw in the group.
Greed
You see greed
at work especially in businesses where people are making huge sums or are
susceptible of doing so. The various leaders as well their members will
approach you to join their team to succeed faster in such and such a company. When
you tell them you are already in that company and in a team other than theirs, they
would ask you to leave that team, write to the company that you were no longer interested
in continuing with them and they will delete your name. Then you use a
different username and email address to sign up.
Another
case is when you bring people into a group for a business, then other members
private message them to join them rather because they have a larger group which
can make them succeed earlier.
Another
example of cross-solicitation is when people contact you with the systems of a
company and propose that you join them in another company.
Double standards
Another
unethical behaviour of the onfia is what I call double standards. You suggest
to your Facebook friends to join your business and they tell you they aren’t
interested. Then they go online, find out about it and sign up with someone
else. This often happens with businesses in pre-launch and especially with
those where a sponsor is needed to sign up. These “friends” prefer to join
leaders they know and with whom they think they can succeed quicker since they
can benefit from spillovers and spillunders.
Self-importance or bumptiousness
This concerns
leaders whose links I joined eagerly and with whom I was acquainted. But when I
found an interesting business and sent them the link to join, they replied they
would never join anyone’s link; but many times they simply ignored my message.
Extortion
I observed
this mainly with advertising. People claim that they could earn you leads,
prospects or buyers. You pay, send them your ads and see nothing at the end of
the promotion period. They tell you nobody can assure you with advertising that
there will be results.
Virus-propagation.
Everybody, but
none more so than online workers, using the internet is exposed to virus
attacks from unscrupulous people.
Online work
succeeds best with networking. Some unscrupulous people profit from this and
send you links to check one thing or the other. Unsuspectingly you do this and
realize you have been sent a virus.
People
claim these viruses are sent by manufacturers and sellers of anti-virus
programs to oblige computer users to buy their products. Russians are mainly
indexed here but it is believed that this is the modus operandi of most of
anti-virus software suppliers.
Trial or
free anti-virus programs can also spread viruses. At the end of the trial
period, the supplier sends you a message to buy the product. People claim that
when you don’t, they send you viruses to oblige you to buy to save your
computer from crashing. The free programs are also said to send you viruses so
that you look to buy their paid programs which offer better virus
coverage.
Lessons learnt
With each
bad experience, I learn a lesson which obliges me to change direction.
Scamming, Perjury and Trickery
Since stopping
brokerage activities involving trading of big boys’ commodities where huge
commissions are promised, I have been saved from scamming, perjury and trickery.
Besides, I systematically
delete any message coming from Nigerian scammers or similar ones containing
promises of fabulous gains without any work.
Non-existent customer service
Right now,
an agency is investigating a company which recently failed to refund me for
poor advertising services. So, instead of engaging in useless correspondence
with rogue companies, I report them to anti-fraud agencies in their countries.
Fraud
Now that I
know trustworthy internet marketers (those with ethical working methods and/or
help their downlines), I only join programs in which they participate.
Unscrupulousness
These days
I ask my uplines for places where I can advertise for good results.
Concerning
teams, I join only those which are functioning well and at the head of which is
a known leader in the multi-level marketing world. I also read the group posts
to see if no hard sentiments were being expressed about the leaders. I feel at
ease where I find the members full of praise for the leader(s).
Greed
When
somebody tells me to leave a team and the same company in which we are and
rejoin that company with his team or when they private message me to join them
rather because they have a larger group which can make me succeed earlier, I
tell them it is an unethical behaviour and I couldn’t trust somebody like them
making such a suggestion. This makes them disappear quickly from your path.
Double standards
When Facebook
friends to whom I suggest a business tell me they aren’t interested and turn
around and join someone else in the same business, I simply unfriend them.
Self-importance or bumptiousness
I no longer
join businesses proposed by leaders who refuse to join my links without reason or
ignore my messages in that regard.
Extortion
The lesson
I have learnt here is join a group if you must but don’t depend on anyone to
build your business.
Virus-propagation.
I don’t
click on links sent by people I don’t know well.
Trial or
free anti-virus programs are another no-go area, unless they were coming from
credible sources like McAfee.
These are the
setbacks I have had online and how they have taught me. And you, what are your
experiences with the online mafia and what lesson(s) have you learnt from them?
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