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joewein.de LLC
fighting spam and scams on the Internet
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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:
- This email uses a separate reply address that is different from the sender address. Spammers use this to get replies even when the original spam sending accounts have been shut down. Also, sometimes the sender addresses are legitimate looking but fake and only the reply address is actually an email account controlled by the scammers.
- The following phrases in this message should put you on alert:
- "hundred thousand 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)
- "top secret" (scammers urge victims to keep the transaction secret because they don't want anyone to point out to them that it is a scam)
- This email message is a 419 scam. Please see our 419 FAQ for more details on such scams.
Fraud email example:
From: "Stephen Cheung" <stephen.cheung69@cdachambers.com>
Reply-To: stephen.cheung96@gmail.com
Date: Wed, 17 Nov 2010 13:16:48 +0800
Subject: Your reliance required.
First I must solicit your confidence in this transaction; this is by virtue of its nature as being utterly confidential and top secret. Though I know that a transaction of this magnitude will make any one apprehensive and worried, but I am assuring you that this is real and genuine.
My name is Stephen Cheung. I am an attorney with Clement & Dawn Associates Kuala Lumpur Malaysia. I am 54 years of age and married with (3) lovely kids. I am writing to solicit your assistance in the transfer of One Million Three Hundred Thousand United States Dollars.
This fund belongs to my late client. My aim of writing to you is to seek your consent and present your humble self as trustee of my departed patron’s estate as the bank had issued me several notifications on my capacity as the departed Counsel to provide a lawful representative thereof. Moreover, the fact that there is no surviving relative or trustee to inherit the estate of my departed patron which may spur the bank to classify the estate as unserviceable and officially no collectable after statutory time limit imposed by the law.
The bank since then, placed this amount on a suspense account without a beneficiary pending when one will come up for the claim. As his attonery, I cannot be directly connected to this money thus I am impelled to request for your assistance to receive this money into your bank account. I intend to part 35% of this fund to you while 65% shall be for me. I do need to stress that there are practically no risk involved in this. Its going to be a bank-to-bank transfer. If you accept this offer, I will appreciate your timely response.
With Regards,
Stephen Cheung Esq.
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Anti-fraud resources:
