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joewein.de LLC
fighting spam and scams on the Internet
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"419" Scam – Advance Fee / Fake Lottery Scam
The so-called "419" scam is a type of fraud dominated by criminals from Nigeria and other countries in Africa. Victims of the scam are promised a large amount of money, such as a lottery prize, inheritance, money sitting in some bank account, etc.
Victims never receive this non-existent fortune but are tricked into sending their money to the criminals, who remain anonymous. They hide their real identity and location by using fake names and fake postal addresses as well as communicating via anonymous free email accounts and mobile phones.
Keep in mind that scammers DO NOT use their real names when defrauding people.
The criminals either abuse names of real people or companies or invent names or addresses.
Any real people or companies mentioned below have NO CONNECTION to the scammers!
Read more about such scams here or in our 419 FAQ. Use the Scam-O-Matic to verify suspect emails.
Click here to report a problem with this page.
Some comments by the Scam-O-Matic about the following email:
- This email uses a separate reply address that is different from the sender address. Spammers use this to get replies even when the original spam sending accounts have been shut down. Also, sometimes the sender addresses are legitimate looking but fake and only the reply address is actually an email account controlled by the scammers.
- This email message is a 419 scam. Please see our 419 FAQ for more details on such scams.
Fraud email example:
From: African Union Anti Fraud <seegs007@yahoo.com>
Reply-To: African Union Anti Fraud <africanunion.antifraud@ymail.com>
Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 17:09:16 -0700 (PDT)
Subject: African Union Anti-Fraud Unit (Your refund cheque)
Attention,
To whom it may concern
This is from the African Union (AU) Anti-fraud team in collaboration with the United Nations (UN) in regards to the extensive raid (arrests) on Internet scammers. Due to the high rate of complain we have been receiving from United Nations (UN) on the level of Scam artists/fraudsters with African nationalities. All the Internet Service Providers had noticed the increased email traffic originating from African to other continents.
In this raid, three hundred and six (356) scammers were arrested so far and the raid is still on. We have recovered the total sum of US$3.2 Billion from them from both cash and assets confirmed to have come from their victims. As we have found hundreds of thousands of email addresses of victims from their address books. It is at this juncture that we are contacting you.
The African Union (AU) with the United Nation (UN) are making refunds of US$350,000.00 each to victims whom his/her email address was listed on the scammer's address books.
Confirm through this email if you are the true possessor of this email, and provide us with the following information for your refund.
Your Names:
Sex:
Age:
Nationality:
Tel number
Mr. Charles Nqakula
(Safety & Security Minister)
African Union Anti-Fraud Unit.
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Anti-fraud resources:
