Scam baiting is the practice of pretending interest in a fraudulent scheme in order to influence a scammer in many possible ways. The purpose of scam baiting might be to waste the scammers' time, embarrass them, cause them to reveal confidential information which can be passed on to legal authorities in the hope that they will be prosecuted, or simply to amuse the baiter. The scam baiting process is very much useful and successful if done with basic rules.

The goals of scam baiting carry the pleasure of baiters and their readers. To that end, a general status symbol among scam baiters is the collection or display of a photographic "trophy," a picture apparently taken of the scammer, typically while holding custom made signs, or in odd poses with exact props (such as placing a fish on one's head). Other trophies could include documents such as oaths and the pseudo legal documents, taken as the 419 scamr as a step forward towards a hopeless goal.

There are handfuls on common sense basic rules, which a scam baiter should follow:

1. The first rules is to have a good anti-virus software running on your system all the time and do keep the virus definitions ready. This is must for any computer which has internet connection but it is most significant for the scam baiting.

2. Make sure you don’t believe in anything, which a scammer tells you until you know it is true. In case scammer tells you “here is my photo” you could argue it isn’t. If on Monday the scammer tells you its Monday, check the calendar. It’s possibly Tuesday.

3. Next you should make sure that you do not give any real personal information to the scammer. This needs to be very obvious. Any actual personal information carries your real name, real address, place of work, real bank account number, and personal e-mail address and so on.

4. Remember you should never go to meet any scammer in person, regardless of their location given. As most scammers are just nothing more than pretty cheat artists, there had been many cases of muggings, kidnappings and also murder of people who had gone to meet with 419 scammers. Please do not do it.

5. And the most important rule is, you should never involve directly any innocent third parties in your scam bait. No matter how much you may hate you boss or your ex-spouse, don’t take revenge through this. You should not take on the identity of any real person existing or do not send a scammer to meet with any real person.