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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.

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

Fraud email example:

From: (sent from abused email account)
Reply-To: <smithwalker86@yahoo.it>
Date: Fri, 24 Oct 2008 16:13:46 +0000
Subject: Greetings to you



Greetings to youWith warm heart I offer my friendship, and greetings,and I hopeful that this mail will meet you in good time. However strange or surprising this contact might seem to you as we have not met personally or had any dealings in the past, I humbly ask that you take due consideration of it's importance and the immense benefit it will be to us (YOU AND I ). If this e-mail letter of proposal fails to meet your personal or desired business ethics kindly accept my sincere apology, nevertheless, I strongly believe that it will.Firstly, my name is Mr. Walter Smith an auditor with one of the leading banks here in the United Kingdom. My proposal is that, during our last auditing I discovered that one of our accounts, with a balance of £20,000,000.00 (Twenty- Million Pounds Sterling) has been dormant and was last operated 6 years ago. From my investigation and confirmation, the owner of the said account, a foreigner by name John Shumejda who died on the 4th of January 2002 in a plane crash within the European Air space. For more details visit:http://edition.cnn.com/2002/WORLD/europe/01/04/england.plane/http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/1742404.stmSince then, nobody has done anything as regards the claiming of this Fund, as he has no family member that has any knowledge as to the existence of either the account or the funds: and information from the national immigration also states that he was single on entry into the UK. I therefore propose to do business with you in receiving this fund in any of your preferable account; an empty account can serve provided it is valid. Because, this fund can be approve for payment for a foreigners only due to the deceased owner is also a foreigner. Be inform that this transaction is 100% total risk free: and troubles as the fund is legitimate and does not originate from drug, money laundry, terrorism or any other illegal act.Upon the successful transfer of the fund to your account, you will be given 40% of the total amount 50% will be for me while the remaining 10% will donated to the Charity Organizations. On your interest, let me hear from you so we can proceed with the process, Also include you private phone number so I can call you.Warm Regards,Mr. Walter Smith

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