I would really like to appreciate your patience and the efforts you made to trap the fraudster, and then capture the whole experience in this video in such detail for us out here. Keep it up. :)
From California Your work in fighting scams is invaluable. I was scammed twice last year, totaling losses over $120,000. It was a lengthy process involving federal intervention to get her money back. We need more people like *Prophecy Trace* taking a stand against these criminals. Much love and support from California.
This was anxiety inducing. Props to you. I would have stopped communicating after a small hint of the unprofessionally written messages. If it starts out like that, it can only get worse from there.
I am glad you are back to making videos. This also almost happened to me. But I asked if he could let my friend view the flat and he said he was in some other country. So I said if I can not get someone to view it then I don't want it. He said it is very hard getting accommodation in Berlin, I shouldn't let this opportunity pass by. I just said, it's fine, even if I have to live in an Airbnb for a month, I would rather do that.
Fascinating video watching this attempted scam unfold. Nice to see you wasted so much of his time. Hopefully the authorities can do something about him.
@@ExpatCaptures Hi I recognize this name by a surname pass his details to MUP this is Croatian National Police and SOA they will pick him up later. It does not matter where he is Germany Austria Croatia he is done for MUP Croatian Police and SOA which is our Intel service I take it you are interested in pinching the bastard pass his details to Croatian Cyber security teams as well if you can send an email to all three of them thank you!.Oh and Expat in order for us to pick him up send as much information and Intel on everything including your messages pay pal he provided etc. our German allies will catch up to him. He is finished send all of this to MUP, SOA and Croatian Cyber security teams we will take care of him thank you for posting this ... he is done for especially now with all of this information you provided. He will be arrested for fraud, we are in good relations with Austrians and Germans they will deliver him to us or if he is home the Police will find him!.
This is an eye-opener, I appreciate the hard work you put in here and used various platforms to check the level of scammer. Thanks, i will definitely use these portal in future if need be. Thanks a ton.
Great video! I am moving to Berlin in two weeks and looking for a place to stay has been really hard. In just some days of looking for an apartment I encountered some scammers myself, all with the same speach as in the video.
It's a shame that foreigners are scammed by foreigners here in Germany. It also happens many times that they got robbed because they don't expect this in Germany. Unfortunately, things have changed here over the years.
Thanks so much for your persistence. I would not have had the patience. These scammers are still at it! I have a refugee from Ukraine staying with me and she has shown me several very sketchy messages she has received about apartments. Some of them even sent photos of apartments that are very obviously not even in Germany (wrong windows, wrong shape appliances etc).
So funny, I got responses with the exact same wording as you are showing, just for a different city/price. They are using the same template apparently 😅Now I know that is a scam for sure. Thanks for the video!
Hi, thanks for the video. Can you please advise where can I report a scammer? I am searching now for a flat, and someone wrote from a facebook profile what was created a few months ago, and under a woman’s name. They requested me to send a deposit in advance, to a bank account of a guy. Also I recognized the pictures from an advertisement I saw earlier, and asked her to reply on the website of the flat advertisements, which she didn’t do. It is obviously a scam, and I want them to be caught.
I encountered a similar scam today. I did share my passport details for the contract, but didn't pay the amount cause i suspected a scam. What can they do using my passport details 😕?
I am so glad I clicked on this video. But unfortunately I already sent him the details and he told me to pay his lawyer instead of him. And the paypal mail also said family and friends. I got super suspicious of him then
@@ExpatCaptures No I haven't thankfully. I saw the "Friends and Family" part when he gave me the lawyer email id and got even more suspicious. Immediately jumped onto UA-cam to find your video. He gave me all this after I signed the agreement. So I am kind of facepalming myself now.
Great content. I recently faced a similar scam while searching for an apartment in Hamburg, Germany. I still have the contact of the so called "landlord" but would like to track him so that other don't fall in the same trap. Would appreciate if someone could help me trace this scammer. Thanks!
Thank you for the video. I just got scammed in the similar way. The thing is that I was moving to Bonn and I couldn't visit the flat myself from abroad, so I didn't notice that it was also not offered. It was also interesting because sending the deposit didn't work at the beginning and then I got my money back. But then we tried through PayPal, and now I've sent the deposit and the first month and didn't get anything. I was suspicious, but after watching your video, because "the style or writing" is very similar, I realise it's a scam and I don't know what to do now. Do you think there is a chance that I can get my money back? Through police? Or should I just forget about it? I really don't know what to do now..
Honestly it's a bit hard when you've already paid them. I'm sorry you had to experience this. Did you tick 'transfer to friends and family' when you paid through PayPal? If so, it would be very hard to get it back unfortunately. You could try to reach out to PayPal to see if they can identify the person but it might be hard due to privacy and data reasons. 🙁
I am thinking to move from köln to Berlin .Do you have a video with flats that are with furniture.? I saw your other Video which showed the empty flat. This is crazy.I am looking for a Flat not an empty room. many thanks
Yes and no to some of these things...my wife and I live in another country, but have a flat in Germany. We don't speak German so we write in English lol
@@ExpatCaptures If you are a developer, it will be pretty easy. but if you are not, maybe you can use some email tracking tools to help you. the email tracking tools add an invisible image of one pixel inside the emails. This pixel image is loaded when the recipient opens the emails, allowing you to know when it's opened.
I word of advice, which by the way, I base my opinion on a person by their actions and not where they are from or their ethnicity. There are decent, considerate and people of good moral character all over the world. Be very cautious with regards to who will be your neighbors. I lived next to Indian computer engineering students. Ever since they moved in I have been having issues with my Wifi and computer network being hacked. Besides that, they liked to save money and so they will fit about 5 people in a one bedroom apartment. Which causes excessive noise at all hours. Additionally they liked having phone conversations outside which usually tends to be in front of other tenants apartments which can cause a disturbance. They were asked not to disturb other tenements but they still kept doing it. When they used the laundry room they leave the clothes in the machines over night and sometimes even days, and do not clean up after themselves once they are done. Additionally, They are not very clean in general. Once an animal did poo near their front door and they never cleaned it up. This attracted flies in my home. It was a mess. Once they finally moved, everything was better. And the fly problem in my home went away. I am saddened and disturbed that people like this are moving in to Germany and causing a decline in society and the German way of life. I hope that something can be done about this.
Whoa you won't believe what happened to me today. I had put up an ad for wanting an apartment on WG gesucht, since my uni starts next month and i don't have a place to stay yet. I got a message on the app and i got asked for my email. Immediately afterwards she sent me some photos and the apartment looked too good to be true . The rent was also dirt cheap. She even sent me her photos along with the apartment and her passport copy. Is it real or am I being scammed since i have a photo of her passport
People can definitely create fake IDs, but what you can do is ask to view the apartment in person. Genuine landlords should allow you to do that without anything money-related coming into the conversation :)
@@ExpatCaptures I sent a follow up mail for am apartment viewing and we'll i haven't received a reply to that yet. Strange because every other mail was sent in lightning speed. Cant believe I was almost scammed . I was almost inclined to believe it wasn't a scam because she sent me a copy of her passport
@@asba7634 probably the photo of the passport is of somebody else's passport, someone she tried to scam and asked for a photo of the passport. Scammers do this kind of identity theft all the time, sadly.
The same way try to scam me a guy when I wanted to rent a room in Copenhagen. He even created fake Facebook account with fake passport what he sent me as a scam. I can provide you details and photos it will be good if you could document it in video
Sorry to say that but I m the victim of these guys, I wish I could watch this perfect video 2 days ago. Damn. By the way I asked n26 to get back my money from this criminals and open a case in Düsseldorf police, what should I do more ?
I'm so sorry to hear that. If you've already wired money across, it's a long shot unfortunately. ☹️ You could try to track them down. And course provide the police the email. If you're interested in seeing how far you can go, you could create a new email address and try using IP logger to bait them. Sorry again mate..
@@ExpatCaptures yeah wired like idiots:) I shared scammers email adress with police today but if I have a chance to get their IP, (by the way you are pro) what can police do ?
I would really like to appreciate your patience and the efforts you made to trap the fraudster, and then capture the whole experience in this video in such detail for us out here. Keep it up. :)
Oh thanks for the nice comment Sheshant! Appreciate you watching this- stay safe and healthy 🙌🙏
From California Your work in fighting scams is invaluable. I was scammed twice last year, totaling losses over $120,000. It was a lengthy process involving federal intervention to get her money back. We need more people like *Prophecy Trace* taking a stand against these criminals. Much love and support from California.
What a pity this guy just ‘stopped’ posting videos. Something obviously happened? Lost job, moved. He was a great presenter.
This was anxiety inducing. Props to you.
I would have stopped communicating after a small hint of the unprofessionally written messages. If it starts out like that, it can only get worse from there.
I really felt like stopping the conversation for sure. Thank you for watching and stopping by 🥰🥲
@@ExpatCapturesyou could easily do undercover work, phew!! Please come back. Let us know you are okay😊
I am glad you are back to making videos.
This also almost happened to me. But I asked if he could let my friend view the flat and he said he was in some other country. So I said if I can not get someone to view it then I don't want it.
He said it is very hard getting accommodation in Berlin, I shouldn't let this opportunity pass by. I just said, it's fine, even if I have to live in an Airbnb for a month, I would rather do that.
Oh you smart cookie. Good thing you left it with him! Thanks for watching Aina!! 🥰
Fascinating video watching this attempted scam unfold. Nice to see you wasted so much of his time. Hopefully the authorities can do something about him.
Thanks John, I am hoping! 🙏
Woah at least put a disclaimer to not watch alone and in the dark 😰
Will pin your comment and it will be the disclaimer 🤓
🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣, nice!
@@ExpatCaptures Hi I recognize this name by a surname pass his details to MUP this is Croatian National Police and SOA they will pick him up later. It does not matter where he is Germany Austria Croatia he is done for MUP Croatian Police and SOA which is our Intel service I take it you are interested in pinching the bastard pass his details to Croatian Cyber security teams as well if you can send an email to all three of them thank you!.Oh and Expat in order for us to pick him up send as much information and Intel on everything including your messages pay pal he provided etc. our German allies will catch up to him. He is finished send all of this to MUP, SOA and Croatian Cyber security teams we will take care of him thank you for posting this ... he is done for especially now with all of this information you provided. He will be arrested for fraud, we are in good relations with Austrians and Germans they will deliver him to us or if he is home the Police will find him!.
This is an eye-opener, I appreciate the hard work you put in here and used various platforms to check the level of scammer. Thanks, i will definitely use these portal in future if need be. Thanks a ton.
Thanks Deepti!
What an evil piece of work scammer! Makes me furious
I knowwwwwww
Great video! I am moving to Berlin in two weeks and looking for a place to stay has been really hard. In just some days of looking for an apartment I encountered some scammers myself, all with the same speach as in the video.
Thank you Tomas, good luck with your apartment search mate. I hope you find something soon! 🙏
good job! this is honourable work you are doing! we need more people like you.
Excellent video! Thanks so much for all the details and how well you explained it!
Thank you so much Cathy! 🙏
It's a shame that foreigners are scammed by foreigners here in Germany.
It also happens many times that they got robbed because they don't expect this in Germany. Unfortunately, things have changed here over the years.
Yes! A lot of people still fall for these scams sadly :( thanks for coming by 🥰
I'm looking for a rental for long term in Berlin and this video was incredibly helpful.
This was great! Nice work! Thank u!
Thank you for watching it!!! 🥰
Thank you for sharing this follow up
I love the story it is great and helped me out so much please keep up with the advice! Your awesome at telling stories🙂
Thank you so much 🥰
Wow you are a great Guy 💪🏾 keep up the work
Thank you so much I will try 🤓
Really great work ......... Thanks bro
Thank youuuuuuu. Made my day :)
Thanks so much for your persistence. I would not have had the patience. These scammers are still at it! I have a refugee from Ukraine staying with me and she has shown me several very sketchy messages she has received about apartments. Some of them even sent photos of apartments that are very obviously not even in Germany (wrong windows, wrong shape appliances etc).
Yeh I also didn't have the patience 😄
Brilliant job 👍
Thank you for your support as always Dirk! 🥲
Great Video. Thank you so much
Thank you for the comment Tony!!! 👊
So funny, I got responses with the exact same wording as you are showing, just for a different city/price. They are using the same template apparently 😅Now I know that is a scam for sure. Thanks for the video!
My pleasure!
In Czech Republic they also phishing through Airbnb. And I feel so sorry for this company which name is ashamed after this kind of scams.
Yeh I've heard as well. Crazy..
Very useful. Tanks 👍.
Thanks for watching 🥹
Fantastic, thanks very much dear friend
No problems!
Omg those emails looked legit, i would have messed up 😮
Hi, thanks for the video. Can you please advise where can I report a scammer? I am searching now for a flat, and someone wrote from a facebook profile what was created a few months ago, and under a woman’s name. They requested me to send a deposit in advance, to a bank account of a guy. Also I recognized the pictures from an advertisement I saw earlier, and asked her to reply on the website of the flat advertisements, which she didn’t do. It is obviously a scam, and I want them to be caught.
No problem! You can just do an online search on reporting cybercrime in berlin and there will be a few links there for you to look through.
I am getting same kind of emails right now
Thanks for sharing nice video
Thank you!!
Thanks for the Video, I almost got scammed today.
Damn. Keep aware and think about what people say and if it makes sense. Glad you're ok!
I encountered a similar scam today. I did share my passport details for the contract, but didn't pay the amount cause i suspected a scam. What can they do using my passport details 😕?
I am so glad I clicked on this video. But unfortunately I already sent him the details and he told me to pay his lawyer instead of him.
And the paypal mail also said family and friends. I got super suspicious of him then
You paid them already? 😐
@@ExpatCaptures No I haven't thankfully. I saw the "Friends and Family" part when he gave me the lawyer email id and got even more suspicious. Immediately jumped onto UA-cam to find your video.
He gave me all this after I signed the agreement. So I am kind of facepalming myself now.
So lucky. I'm glad you stopped. Take care of yourself and be very careful!
@@ExpatCaptures Thank you and I am so grateful your video helped 😊
Great content. I recently faced a similar scam while searching for an apartment in Hamburg, Germany. I still have the contact of the so called "landlord" but would like to track him so that other don't fall in the same trap. Would appreciate if someone could help me trace this scammer. Thanks!
Good luck! :)
Me too!
Thank you for the video. I just got scammed in the similar way. The thing is that I was moving to Bonn and I couldn't visit the flat myself from abroad, so I didn't notice that it was also not offered. It was also interesting because sending the deposit didn't work at the beginning and then I got my money back. But then we tried through PayPal, and now I've sent the deposit and the first month and didn't get anything. I was suspicious, but after watching your video, because "the style or writing" is very similar, I realise it's a scam and I don't know what to do now. Do you think there is a chance that I can get my money back? Through police? Or should I just forget about it? I really don't know what to do now..
Honestly it's a bit hard when you've already paid them. I'm sorry you had to experience this. Did you tick 'transfer to friends and family' when you paid through PayPal? If so, it would be very hard to get it back unfortunately. You could try to reach out to PayPal to see if they can identify the person but it might be hard due to privacy and data reasons. 🙁
I am thinking to move from köln to Berlin .Do you have a video with flats that are with furniture.? I saw your other Video which showed the empty flat. This is crazy.I am looking for a Flat not an empty room. many thanks
Here's one: ua-cam.com/video/PXWAsgco8qQ/v-deo.html
Great !!!!
That same exact person sent me the exact same email today!!!!
Seriously? Same name same guy?
Can you help me with an appointment too ….I will be moving to Germany in two weeks time
Hey I am no apartment queen! Haha.
It seems like it's not just Germany these scumbags are in the UK as well! I'm going through the same
Good luck and stay alert!
Ninjapoo must be he's real name
Yes and no to some of these things...my wife and I live in another country, but have a flat in Germany. We don't speak German so we write in English lol
Yes but I'm sure you don't write like them 😂
What site did you get scam on?
I didn't get scammed. My friend almost did.
ImmobilienScout24 is the name.
Maybe you can send this person an HTML email with the track image. you can track him if he opens the email.
Sounds a little complex for me haha. Is it easy to implement? 🤔😅
@@ExpatCaptures If you are a developer, it will be pretty easy. but if you are not, maybe you can use some email tracking tools to help you. the email tracking tools add an invisible image of one pixel inside the emails. This pixel image is loaded when the recipient opens the emails, allowing you to know when it's opened.
Thanks mate 🙏 I will look it up. Can it also track IP addresses or does it only tell you when someone has opened it?
I word of advice, which by the way, I base my opinion on a person by their actions and not where they are from or their ethnicity. There are decent, considerate and people of good moral character all over the world. Be very cautious with regards to who will be your neighbors. I lived next to Indian computer engineering students. Ever since they moved in I have been having issues with my Wifi and computer network being hacked. Besides that, they liked to save money and so they will fit about 5 people in a one bedroom apartment. Which causes excessive noise at all hours. Additionally they liked having phone conversations outside which usually tends to be in front of other tenants apartments which can cause a disturbance. They were asked not to disturb other tenements but they still kept doing it. When they used the laundry room they leave the clothes in the machines over night and sometimes even days, and do not clean up after themselves once they are done. Additionally, They are not very clean in general. Once an animal did poo near their front door and they never cleaned it up. This attracted flies in my home. It was a mess. Once they finally moved, everything was better. And the fly problem in my home went away. I am saddened and disturbed that people like this are moving in to Germany and causing a decline in society and the German way of life. I hope that something can be done about this.
You've written three similar comments about Indians. Can you stop please?
Damn this guy had such a bad experience with Indians he’s going around on UA-cam and leaving the same comment everywhere.
Whoa you won't believe what happened to me today. I had put up an ad for wanting an apartment on WG gesucht, since my uni starts next month and i don't have a place to stay yet. I got a message on the app and i got asked for my email. Immediately afterwards she sent me some photos and the apartment looked too good to be true . The rent was also dirt cheap. She even sent me her photos along with the apartment and her passport copy. Is it real or am I being scammed since i have a photo of her passport
People can definitely create fake IDs, but what you can do is ask to view the apartment in person. Genuine landlords should allow you to do that without anything money-related coming into the conversation :)
@@ExpatCaptures I sent a follow up mail for am apartment viewing and we'll i haven't received a reply to that yet. Strange because every other mail was sent in lightning speed. Cant believe I was almost scammed . I was almost inclined to believe it wasn't a scam because she sent me a copy of her passport
@@asba7634 probably the photo of the passport is of somebody else's passport, someone she tried to scam and asked for a photo of the passport. Scammers do this kind of identity theft all the time, sadly.
The same thing happened to me today, it's so frustrating
very interesting
👊
isn't sad what people do
Totally
Are you vietnamese?
The same way try to scam me a guy when I wanted to rent a room in Copenhagen. He even created fake Facebook account with fake passport what he sent me as a scam. I can provide you details and photos it will be good if you could document it in video
All good mate. Thank you! Stay safe and just send the info to your national cyber security organisation.
Wow, sounds like the "craigslist" of Germany, if it sounds too good to be true it IS, NEVER send money to anyone you haven't met or seen! 👀🧠
You got that right Luna! :)
Sorry to say that but I m the victim of these guys, I wish I could watch this perfect video 2 days ago. Damn. By the way I asked n26 to get back my money from this criminals and open a case in Düsseldorf police, what should I do more ?
I'm so sorry to hear that. If you've already wired money across, it's a long shot unfortunately. ☹️ You could try to track them down. And course provide the police the email. If you're interested in seeing how far you can go, you could create a new email address and try using IP logger to bait them. Sorry again mate..
@@ExpatCaptures yeah wired like idiots:) I shared scammers email adress with police today but if I have a chance to get their IP, (by the way you are pro) what can police do ?
Not sure what the actual police would do, but what I did was I reported it to the Cyber Security Police. In Germany, it's called 'Internetwache'.
Is rentola a scam? Ads are all over the place but no reviews and prices too cheap
Not sure actually! Haven't heard of that one 🥲
They are doing it all over Europe.
Better watch out!
Fascinating
You are a fascinating species.
You sound quite South African 😊 are you?
I suppose the Australian and South African accent are quite similar. :)
so many 'OK'. could be an indian :)
These scammers are based in Africa. I managed to track them before.
👍👍
I'm looking for a rental for long term in Berlin and this video was incredibly helpful.