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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.
- The following phrases in this message should put you on alert:
- "lotto.nl.info@aol.nl" (this email address has been used in a known scam)
- This email message is a 419 scam. Please see our 419 FAQ for more details on such scams.
Fraud email example:
From: "claim.alert@virgilio.it" <claim.alert@virgilio.it>
Reply-To: lotto.nl.info@aol.nl
Date: Mon, 3 Oct 2011 20:29:52 +0200 (CEST)
Subject: REMINDER TO THE EMAIL ID OWNER,
REMINDER TO THE EMAIL ID OWNER,
Batch nr: SPYU6868 / Ref.nr: 5687SPL876.
We are pleased to inform you about the up-ward review of your unclaimed fund
to 1:000:000:00 Euro
[One
Million Euro only] due to the Hyper Inflationary trend in the world economy.
Note that this is a ticket free email program, your email emerged among the 5
lucky emails for the prize
still unclaimed in our recent online points draw for emails that frequent our
members domains/sites.
And our records shows that your fund is still unclaimed despite our repeated
reminders in that regards.
For prize claim, Contact via: Email: lotto.nl.info@aol.nl
Tel/Fax: +31.847.549.511.
Send: Your contact details for more information.
Best Regards,
Mrs. Jane Culhane.
Microsoft/Alliance Inter.Net Award.
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Anti-fraud resources:
