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.

 

 

Some comments by the Scam-O-Matic about the following email:

Fraud email example:

From: "anthony okoye" <anthonyokoye55@rediffmail.com>
Date: 16 Jun 2007 00:11:48 -0000
Subject: I ONLY NEED YOUR COPERATION


Dear Friend.
I feel quite safe dealing with you in this important business. Though, this medium (Internet) has been greatly abused, I choose to reach you through it because it remains the fastest medium of communication.
However, this correspondence is unofficial and private, and it should be treated as such, at first I will like to assure you that this transaction is 100% risk and trouble free to both parties.
My name is Dr Anthony Okoye, I work as the operation manager in account management section in charge of credit and foreign bills of one of a prime banks here in Nigeria. On a routine inspection I discovered a dormant domiciliary account with a Balance of US$11,500,000.00 (Eleven Million Five Hundred Thousand dollars only). The account holder (The deceased) was believed to be in charge of former Iraq president, saddam Hussein secret CRUDE OIL transactions in Nigeria before his death.
On further discreet investigation, I also discovered that the account holder has died long ago with his family on a fatal Auto-accident leaving no beneficiary to the account and no other person knows about this account.
I am in close contact with the manager of the bank here who is my partner and he is willing to approve the transfer to any reliable and trustworthy foreigner with foreign bank account because the former operator of the a/c is a foreigner.
I am certainly sure that he has no written or oral WILL attached to the account, no beneficiary and nobody will come again for the claim of this money, it is only a foreigner who can claim this money with legal claims to the account holder which I will provide to you if you are interested, therefore I need your cooperation in this transaction.
This money will remain useless in this dormant account if I did not transfer the fund out to a foreign account.
I will provide the necessary information and documents needed in order to claim this money. I only need your cooperation as a foreigner to provide a safe bank account information for the transfer, preferable I will like you to open a new account for this transaction alone.
All arrangement that will ensure a smooth transfer of the fund to the account, which you are to nominate, is already in place. You should provide me your direct cell phone lines for easy communication.
I wish utmost confidentiality in handling this transaction at the conclusion of this transaction your share will be 35% of the total transfer sum, 60% for me and my partner while 5% will be set aside for any expenses both parties might incure during the process of the transfer.
The fund will be transferred to your account in two parts. I will first transfer USD 4. Million to your account as test transfer I will fly over to meet you after the successful transfer for sharing according to the agreed percentages. I will have the remaining balance of USD7.5 Million transfer to your account only after the successful sharing of the first transfer without any disappointment from your side.
Do Contact me through my Alternative e-mail address; anthonyokoye50@yahoo.com.hk&nbsp;&nbsp; immediately.
RegardsDr. AnthonyAuditor general

Anti-fraud resources: