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"419" Scam – Advance Fee / Fake Lottery Scam

• About the 419 (Advance Fee) scam
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• Phone numbers used by 419 scammers
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• Company names mentioned in 419 spam:
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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.

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:
  • "fiduciary agent" (real lotteries do not use a "claim agent" / "fiduciary agent")
  • "claims agent" (real lotteries do not use a "claim agent" / "fiduciary agent")
• This email message is a fake lottery scam. Consider the following facts about real lotteries:
  
  1. They don't notify winners by email.
  2. You can't win without first buying a lottery ticket.
  3. They don't randomly select email addresses to award prizes to.
  4. They don't use free email accounts (Yahoo, Hotmail, etc) to communicate with you.
  5. They don't tell you to call a mobile phone number.
  6. They don't tell you to keep your winnings secret.
  7. They will never ask a winner to pay any fees to receive a prize!
• 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.
  • hoods_williams@excite.com (email address has been used in a known fraud before)

Fraud email example:

From: "MSN ONLINE LOTTERY PROMOTION" <winning_dept@msn.com>
Reply-To: hoods_williams@excite.com
Date: Fri, 20 Oct 2006 08:20:32 +0000
Subject: CONGRAULATIONS: FROM MSN LOTTERY PROMO

From: The Vice President (Operations)  LOTTERY PROMOTION Promotions/Prize Claim Award Department. REF Nº: MSN/6012505022/3 2 BATCH Nº: 29/3117/1MA Frankfurt-- -Branch-- Germany ATTN: LUCKY WINNER, AWARD WINNING NOTIFICATION/ FINAL NOTICE Email Lottery Promotion wishes to inform you the results of the E -mail address ballot lottery international program by world wide held on 20TH OCTOBER, 2006. Your email address was attached to ticket number 56475600545-188, with serial number 5388/02 drew with lucky numbers No.137 and consequently you Won the lottery in the (A) category. All participants were selected through a computer ballot system drawn from Microsoft users from company and individual email addresses of all kinds of domain. You have therefore been approved a lump sum of TWO MILLION EURO in cash, which is presently deposited in the care of an endowment manager in your favour as sole beneficiary, and covered with an Insurance Policy. For your clarification, your winning number was selected amongst an array of 1,000,000 individual and company e-mail addresses of Microsoft windows application users in all part of the world, by means of a computer ballot system. Due to mix up of some Numbers and addresses, we request that you keep your Winning Information confidential until Funds claims have been processed and your money remitted to you. This is part of our security protocol to avoid double claiming and unwarranted abuse of this program. MSN LOTTERY PROMOTION is world promotional program organized by the MICROSOFT NETWORK GROUP and its partner MICROSOFT NETWORK GROUP America, Europe, Asia. This promotion is entry free, which NO TICKETS ARE PURCHASED. Winners are randomly selected systematically online by E-mail and Country code only. An Electronic Random Selection System (ERSS) generates selections of winners. Your email entered for draw No.137 and was luckily selected among 5 lucky winners. A total of 1 million email addresses were entered for this promotion. Our partner international email service providers/ marketing companies and public services providers submit all emails. Please take your time to review this notification and note the expiration date, which is 21th November 2006. To redeem your prize, simply fill the certificate of your prize claims below. To begin your Lottery Claim, please contact our Fiduciary Agent immediately on the Contact information provided below, quoting your Reference number and batch numbers in all correspondences. ========================================================================== Mr. Hoods Williams Fax: +491-805-482-0490608 Email: hoods_williams@excite.com ========================================================================== Our agents will immediately commence the process to facilitate the Release of your funds as soon as you contact him. You are to send him the following details below: 1. Full name and address. 2. Country. 3. Tel and fax number. 4. Occupation. 5. Your age and Sex 6. Your Brief Profile. 7. Private Email address. 8. Scan and forward your International Passport/Recent Picture. All winning must be claimed not later than 21th November, 2006. After this date all unclaimed funds will be returned to MSN Email Lottery Treasury as unclaimed. Furthermore, should there be any Change of your address; do inform your claims agent as soon as possible. Congratulations!! once again from all our staffs for being a lucky winner of our promotional lottery program.   Yours faithfully, Mr. Van James Hendick Zonal coordinator

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Anti-fraud resources:

• What can you do when you receive 419 spam