scammerFlickr / AMRosario

KUALA LUMPUR (Reuters) – Hundreds of American women are being ensnared by Internet scammers based in Malaysia, with some losing over a quarter of a million dollars, as the country becomes an epicenter for online crime perpetrated by Africans, U.S. officials say.The mostly Nigerian conmen, who enter Malaysia on student visas, take advantage of the country’s good Internet infrastructure to prey on lonely, middle-aged women, wooing them on dating websites before swindling their savings, they said.

The scams are more sophisticated than most Nigeria-based operations – which most Internet users have experienced at some time either via email or advertising – helped by Malaysia’s advanced banking system, which allows perpetrators to quickly set up accounts and receive international transfers.

U.S. officials say Malaysian police lack the resources and expertise to tackle the problem and have yet to launch a single prosecution of a case involving a U.S. victim.

Malaysian police were reported by local media last December as saying that the number of Internet scam cases more than doubled in 2013 with total losses of more than $11 million. A total of 476 Africans had been apprehended for suspected involvement, the report said.

The Malaysian police and the Nigerian embassy in Kuala Lumpur did not respond to Reuters’ request for comment. A spokesman for Nigeria’s Economic and Financial Crimes Commission said he was not aware of scammers operating in Malaysia, but added they were known to have international networks.

Tim Scherer, consul general at the U.S. embassy in Kuala Lumpur, told Reuters that complaints about such scams now made up more than 80 percent of inquiries to duty officers at the mission, with a dozen new cases reported every week.

Citizens of Australia, Canada and Europe had also been targeted, he said.

“These are not rich widows who are being preyed on, these are middle-class Americans who don’t have this kind of money to spare,” he said. “It can really transform their lives in a very terrible way.”

The U.S. embassy estimates that U.S. victims are losing several million dollars a year, with two women in the past 12 months losing more than $250,000 each. There are more than 600 cases a year, and the amount lost by each victim averages in the tens of thousands of dollars, it said.

The actual figure of total losses is probably far higher, Scherer said, because many victims are too embarrassed to come forward or do not know who to contact. He said the scammers were highly sophisticated, often grooming victims for months and using convincing techniques such as forging letters purportedly from the U.S. ambassador in Malaysia.