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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:

Fraud email example:

From: "Miss Vivian" <vivan@yahoo.com> (may be fake)
Reply-To: vivan_aug@yahoo.com
Date: Wed, 26 Jul 2006 13:47:05 +0200
Subject: please try and respond to me urgent.

Hello,
I am Vivian a native of Liberia residing currently in
dakar senegal,l knows that this email may comes to you
as a supprise but l am appeal not to be angry or you
may think that it is a spam it is not it is a directed
message to you,l have some certain things very personal
that it interest me to discuss with you very private,this is
some of mutual benefit and it will be realised only if you
can respond and reply to this email. I want to assure for
the reason of security l could not go any extra miles in
given you details of this email of explaning whom l am
now,but l most have to appologies that this is the first
thing l have to do in your next mail given details of whom
l am and sending you my pictures and more details on
the main thing l will love to discuss with you. I will be
waiting for your reply.
Cares, Vivian.



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