Five Nigerian criminal gangs are behind most scams targeting sellers on Craigslist, and they’ve taken new measures to make their swindles appear legitimate, according to a new study.

In a new innovation, they’re using professional check-writing equipment plus U.S.-based accomplices to not raise suspicions among their victims.

“I think the most surprising thing was the number of people in the U.S. participating in this scam,” said Damon McCoy, an assistant professor in the computer science department at George Mason University, in a phone interview.

McCoy and colleague Jackie Jones, of George Mason’s information technology department, seeded Craigslist with advertisements for laptops to see if they could attract scammers who target sellers.

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