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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:
- An email address listed inside this email has been used in a known fraud before.
- The following phrases in this message should put you on alert:
- "dear friend" (a common phrase found in 419 scams)
- This email message is a next of kin scam.
- This email lists free webmail addresses. Use of such addresses is typical for scams. Lotteries, banks and any but the smallest of companies do not normally use such addresses. Criminals use them to anonymously send and receive email at Internet cafes.
- jkhumalo909@hotmail.com (email address has been used in a known fraud before)
Fraud email example:
From: John Khumalo <jkhumalo651@gmail.com>
Date: Wed, 17 Sep 2014 23:11:42 +0200
Subject: FUND TRANSFER
Dear Friend,
With due respect to your person and great sincerity
of purpose in which I decide to contact you as I believe you will be of
great assistance to me. Meanwhile, it's just my urgent need for foreign
partner that made me to contact you for this transaction. I am a banker by
profession from South Africa and currently holding the post of Director
Auditing and Accounting unit of the bank. I have the opportunity of
transferring the left over funds ($10million) of one of my bank clients who
died along with his entire family on 31 July 2000 in a plane crash. You can
confirm the genuiness of the deceased death by clicking on this web site.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/859479.stm
Hence, I am inviting you for a business deal where this money can be shared
between us in the ratio of 60/40. If you agree to my business proposal.
Further details of the transfer will be forwarded to you as soon as I
receive your return mail.
Have a great day. Reply to jkhumalo909@hotmail.com
Yours.
Mr. John Khumalo
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Anti-fraud resources:
