LARB Radio Hour · Jun 19, 2026 · 47:14
Listen in the Podli app 🎧
Follow your favourite podcasts, listen offline and in the car with CarPlay and Android Auto, and always pick up where you left off. Free to try.
Eric Newman and Medaya Ocher are joined by journalist Carlos Barragán, whose new book is called The Yahoo Boys: Love, Deception, and the Real Lives of Nigeria's Romance Scammers. After his own mother is targeted by a scammer pretending to be an American soldier, reporter and researcher Barragán made his way down to Lagos, Nigeria to investigate the so-called "Yahoo Boys," young men who catfish millions out of lonely victims. Barragán immerses himself in the group, exploring how scamming has been shaped by the global economy, how it has become a local industry and how these young men are finding agency, experiencing loss, and navigating their lives online and off.