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LISTSERV 16.5 - ARLIS-L Archives
Dear ARLIS-L subscribers,
I apologize to Mr. Omar and to you if my reply seemed rude. I am not
going to try to justify it- however, I am going to tell you about a
recent incident which was in my mind during my response.
Less than 3 weeks ago we had an incident while preparing for the St.
Louis conference. It was handled very well by Clarke and the Conference
leadership. Thus, you have not been previously informed.
8 Islamic Nigerians attempted to fraudulently register for the upcoming
conference all of whom were using yahoo accounts (same as Mr. Omar) all
of whom gave no address (same as Mr. Omar) and all of whom used the same
credit card.
They wanted us to fax the US Embassy in Abuja, Nigeria and arrange for US
visas so they could leave the country.
After consulting with the African bibliographer here at Columbia whether
they were in fact librarians and determining that they were not, I
contacted the US Embassy and informed them of the visa scam.
Below is a copy of the email from the Embassy in response as well as my
original email.
I also alerted two societal affiliates who are having conference soon-
AASL and ARLIS/UK & Eire.
Many of us have received emails from "retired generals with millions
of dollars". Since Mr. Omar used an anonymous yahoo email address
and he did not inform us of his institutional affiliation in his first
posting, I felt justified in issuing a caution. BTW- he is not
listed in the web-based UMass Amherst directory.
This is my last word on this- I am too busy to take up further time since
the conference is in a week.
Times have changed and we must be more vigilant- I'm sorry if my manner
upsets some people.
Ted Goodman, President
ARLIS/NA
[log in to unmask]
-----------------------------
From: "Lacy, Melanie S" @state.gov>
To: "'Ted Goodman'" <[log in to unmask]>
Subject: RE: Nigerian Conference Delegates
Date: Tue, 26 Feb 2002 09:55:56 -0500
X-Mailer: Internet Mail Service (5.5.2654.89)
Mr. Goodman,
I sincerely thank you for your vigilance in this matter. Everyday we
encounter applicants who try to secure visas under fraudulent pretenses.
With regard to this particular case, I checked our database and it seems
as
though 3 of the applicants tried to obtain visas but were denied by one
of
our consular officers. Now that we have the names of the others, we will
definitely be on alert should they too try to apply for visas.
Again, thank you for notifying us, doing your part to help meet the
challenging task of protecting our borders.
-----Original Message-----
From: Ted Goodman
[mailto:[log in to unmask]]
Sent: Monday, February 25, 2002 9:31 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Fwd: Nigerian Conference Delegates
Hi- I am the President of the Art Libraries Society of North America
(web:
www.arlisna.org
<http://www.arlisna.org/> ).
I just want to alert you that the following 6 Nigerians [2 additional came later that day] have attempted to
register for our annual conference to be held Mar. 20-26, 2002 in St.
Louis, MO. I think it is a scam and I just wanted to alert you to the fact
that they may be trying to get visas.
SPENCER NOSA, USIOMOIFO IKPONWOSA, USIOMOIFO
OLUSOLA, BANTALE ADEDAMOLA, MOHAMMED HASSAN,
MICHAEL AKINTUNDE, OLANREWAJU HASSAN
Do not issue any US visas to these persons- I do not believe they are
legitimate librarians who would be registering for an art librarians
conference! In fact, they could even be Islamic terrorists trying to
fraudulently get into the US.
Please let me know if you have had other encounters with them and if I
should be aware of other dangers.
Thank you,
Ted Goodman, President
Art Libraries Society of North America
Columbia University
1172 Amsterdam Ave., MC0301
New York, NY 10027
tel: 212-854-8407
fax: 212-854-8904
email: [log in to unmask]
At 09:31 AM 03/12/2002 -0500, Raymond Smith wrote:
I also found the response to Mr. Omar's query uncalled for and was quite
taken aback by the two quite rude replies. It was an innocent request
and quite similar to others posted by either the membership or library
students. Not too long ago I learned in response to my question as to
the exclusivity of the Arlis List Serve that it was open to anyone who
found our web site of interest. Since it is indeed open to the public,
need we get paranoid with regard to such queries from outside the
membership? I think Mr. Omar deserves an apology, as his question was
an interesting one and in no way threatening nor demanding. Perhaps
some of our membership may also consider providing an answer to his
question regarding important art centers in the U.S.
Raymond Smith
R.W. Smith Bookseller
New Haven, Connecticut
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