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"419" Scam – Advance Fee / Fake Lottery Scam

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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.

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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:
  • "million united states dollars" (they want you to be blinded by the prospect of quick money, but the only money that ever changes hands in 419 scams is from you to the criminals)
  • "very confidential" (scammers urge victims to keep the transaction secret because they don't want anyone to point out to them that it is a scam)
  • "god fearing " (scammers in West Africa like to use religious phrases)
• This email message is a 419 scam. Please see our 419 FAQ for more details on such scams.
  
• 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.
  • albdev@hotmail.com (email address has been used in a known fraud before)

Fraud email example:

From: "Mrs. Albina Lebedev" <noreply@zoominternet.net>
Reply-To: albdev@hotmail.com
Date: Fri, 3 Jul 2009 13:20:30 -0500 (PET)
Subject: Re: For your attention



Greetings,

I know that this mail will get to you as a surprise but it was due to a
matter of necessity i contacted you over a business proposal and
assistance for our relocation. Let me quickly introduce myself, i am Mrs.
Albina Lebedev, the wife of Russian multi billionaire Mr. Platon Lebedev,
who was the former director of Group MENATEP in Russia, a holding company
with diversified assets of $20 billion, primarily in oil and gas, mineral
fertilizers, telecommunications and information technologies, and banking
and financial services. Group MENATEP was the majority shareholder of
YUKOS. My husband was once a very successful businessman and following the
privatization of YUKOS in the mid-1990s. He became Vice President and Head
of YUKOS Refining and Marketing. He was instrumental in all decisions,
including investment decisions, accounting, financial reporting and the
expansion of Group MENATEP's holdings. He sought to position Group MENATEP
as a link to the West for major Western investors considering a move into
Russia. He applied Western standards and practices to Russia, helping
Western partners better understand the Russian business world but right
now as we speak, he is currently a political prisoner and a symbol of the
Kremlin's willingness to silence and punish its critics, his arrest was
also a way for the Kremlin to break down Group MENATEP's business and to
further the re-nationalization of Russia's oil and gas industry.

He was innocent for the crimes the Russian Authorities accused him of
committing but yet currently serving his sentence (nine years) in a remote
area of Siberia. His placement in Siberia is at odds with Russia's health
protection measures for inmates, he has suffered from chronic hepatitis
and cardiovascular dystonia which causes abrupt swings in arterial
pressure and can lead to loss of consciousness, he was unfairly persecuted
for political reasons. His continued imprisonment is further evidence of
an unfair regime that crushes its opponents, punishes its critics and
extinguishes freedom in Russia.

You can read more on this website:
http://www.robertamsterdam.com/2007/10/platon_lebedev_statement.htm

As a result of the allegation, all our accounts were frozen and properties
confiscated except for a profiling amount of twenty- nine million United
States dollars in cash, properly insured and sealed under the UN
diplomatic core, which he starched with a depository firm in Europe for
our future upkeep in the case of such matters. We have been on the run
since his arrest because the Russian Authorities believed that i may have
information concerning some of his foreign financial aids, hence the
reason why we are currently looking for all possible means to relocate to
a very confidential place and never to have anything to do with the
Russians until my husband his out from prison.

I had to contact you as a God fearing individual to stand as the
beneficiary of the above quoted sum and also make immediate preparations
to relocate us once the funds are secured. For your assistance in
embarking on this task for us, you will receive thirty-percent of the
total funds once the transaction is completed. If you know you can do
this, contact me via my private box: albdev@hotmail.com so that I can
furnish you with more details but if my offer is of no appeal to you,
delete this message and forget I ever contacted you.

I await your reply,

Regards,

Mrs. Albina Lebedev.
Email: albdev@hotmail.com

Anti-fraud resources:

• What can you do when you receive 419 spam