joewein.net   joewein.de LLC
fighting spam and scams on the Internet
Try our spam filter!
Free trial for 30 days
  jwSpamSpy

Home
About Us
Spam
419/Nigeria
Fraud
Contact

"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.

 

 

Fraud email example:

From: "West Williams" <westwilliams001@hotmail.com>
Reply-To: anthonywilliams@maktoob.com
Date: Fri, 02 Sep 2005 02:22:20 +0000
Subject: IMMEDIATE CONTACT:

Anthony  Williams
Manager, Internal Audit/
Foreign Remittance Dept,
Union Bank Plc,
36 Broad Street,
Victoria Island, Lagos.
Attn Sir/Madam,
My name is  Anthony  Williams An account officer to late Mr. Craig Jones who use to worked for an oil firm in Nigeria. Mr Craig Jones a well known Philanthropist, before he died, he made a WILL stating that $15.2M(Fifteen million, two hundred thousand U.S. dollars only) should be donated to
any Philanthropist of our choice oversea and your email was randomly picked as the beneficiary of the said funds.
We have made a random draw your  e-mail address was picked as the beneficiary to this Will. I am particularly interested in securing this money from the Bank, because they have issued a notice instructing me been the account officer to produce the beneficiary of this Will within two
weeks or else the money will be credited to the Government treasury as per law here. It is my utmost desire to execute the WILL of my late client as
was instructed when he was a life.
You are required to contact me immediately to start the process of sending this money to any of your designated official account or your off-shore account. I urge you to contact me immediately for further details bearing in mind that the Bank has given us a date limit,Please act
fast.
Please include your phone and fax numbers as you are replying this
mail. Congratulation as I await your urgent reply.
Yours faithfully,
WILLIAMS.

Anti-fraud resources: