Forgive me if this has already been mentioned on the forum.

An American friend was almost caught by this scam today.
One of her friends said that he had been robbed at knife point in London and had lost his money and credit cards.
He was desperate for help to pay his hotel bill.
She e-mailed me and I actually gave her the number of the American Embassy. However, he also contacted another friend who realised that it was a popular scam and is usually set in London.
It seems that the friend is supposed to wire money to the "victim".
Somebody had managed to hack into his Facebook account.

wouldn't you recognize your friend's voice on the phone? or am I missing something?

I assume that he contacted her via Facebook
See http://tinyurl.com/kjs6ag

oh, I get it - I thought they were hacking people's facebook phonebook and calling. It was the word "said" that made me think that it was a verbal, rather then interwebs interaction.

It happened to me two years ago via email. Somebody used (I don't know how) my friend email address and asked , from all the contacts he had), 3000 $ as he is in London without passport, money and credit card.
My friend was in France (where he lives) and knew nothing about this.

Another Fodor's poster said it happened to her mom - somebody hacked into her e-mail, but she caught it on time. Maybe she'll see this thread and post here.