Confidence trick

A confidence trick, confidence game, or con for short (also known as a scam) is an attempt to intentionally mislead a person or persons (known as the mark) usually with the goal of financial or other gain. The confidence trickster, con man, scam artist or con artist often works with an accomplice called the shill, who tries to encourage the mark by pretending to believe the trickster. In a traditional con, the mark is encouraged to believe that they will obtain money dishonestly by cheating a third party, and is stunned to find that due to what appears to be an error in pulling off the scam they are the one who loses money; in more general use, the term con is used for any fraud in which the victim is tricked into losing money by false promises of gain.

Famous con artists

Note: Some inclusions in this list may be disputed.

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• Frank Abagnale, masqueraded as a pilot, doctor and professor
• Margita Bangova, beggar who earned upwards of CAD $2,500 per week
• Howard Berg, with the same con as Kevin Trudeau (see below)
• Lou Blonger, organized massive bunco ring in Denver in early 1900s
• Tony & Sharon Bonicci, a.k.a. Christie & McLean, Australian confidence artists, who rip off innocent elderly people for all their savings and possessions
• Bernie Cornfeld ran what is to date the greatest scam in history, taking in just under $2.5 billion in what was later realized to be a Ponzi scheme.
• Tino De Angelis, who sold rights to $175 million in soybean oil stored in tanks, which was actually a thin layer of oil floating on water.
• Louis Enricht, U.S. chemist who claimed to have made a substitute for gasoline
• Uri Geller, a famous but controversial alleged psychic and television personality
• Robert Hendy-Freegard, British confidence artist who kidnapped people by telling them he was an MI5 agent and they were being hunted by terrorists, then took them on the run, conned them out of money and emotionally manipulated them; convicted in 2005http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/nottinghamshire/4114640.stm
• Susanna Mildred Hill, U.S. woman who fooled potential suitors
• Megan Ireland, Australian con artist and Lottery scammer
• Kaz DeMille Jacobsen, Australian fraudulent 9/11 "motivational speaker"
• Henri Lemoine, French diamond faker
• Matthew Lesko, who claimed that there's free money from the United States Government
• Victor Lustig, sold the Eiffel Tower
• Gregor MacGregor, Scottish conman who tried to attract investment and settlers for a non-existent country of Poyais
• Curtis Malinowski, collected millions of dollars from investors and home buyers with his con businesses.
• George Parker, who sold New York monuments
• Charles Ponzi, the inventor of the pyramid scheme
• Raymond Price, British confidence artist who cons people out of money by telling them his car has broken down and he needs a train fare home; mentioned in the book Join Mehttp://www.join-me.co.uk/raymondprice.html
• Christopher Skase
• Billie Sol Estes, who was paid to produce millions in quotas of cotton, which never existed. LBJ was implicated by Estes in taking payoffs to ignore the scam, which took place in Texas.
• William Thompson
• Kevin Trudeau, who claimed to be able to cure brain damage, increase reading speed in customers up to and beyond the rate of 10000 words per minute, and develop photographic memory.
• Joseph Weil, a.k.a. The Yellow Kid, one of the inspirations for the Academy-award winning film The Sting.