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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:

Fraud email example:

From: Mr. Theophilus Benjamin <mamello20@aim.com>
Reply-To: amadou2006@aol.co.uk
Date: Mon, 14 Mar 2011 11:15:47 +0100
Subject: Your assistance is needed.


Your assistance is needed.

Dear friend,

I suspect that this e-mail will be a surprise to you, I write to seek your
collaboration in a private and confidential matter regarding some funds in
a dormant account in my bank here in South Africa. You are hence being
contacted to be legally nominated as next of kin (inheritor) to a late
client who did not nominate an inheritor or next of kin to his account
before his death

I am Mr. Theophilus Benjamin the chief accountant officer of Standard Bank
of South Africa. Nature of business: We have a customer by name Manfred
Becker, a German citizen whom opened fix deposit account with our bank, at
expiration of the fix deposited the sum of Twelve million three hundred
thousand United States dollars (12,300.000:00 $) he did not turn up to
claim his funds.

Unfortunately I discovered that our customer Mr. Manfred Becker had an
accident with his car and died in the hospital due to the injury he
sustained during the time of accident. I have made several search for his
immediate family or relatives but to no avail, hence I am seeking your
assistance to help us receive this fund in your nominated account as next
of kin, as we are not allowed to open foreign account once we are still in
active service as a civil servant.

I am contacting you because I will not like Mr. Becker long suffering to be
converted into Government account, and I discovered in my search that you
are reliable and trust worthy person whom we can freely handle this
transaction with.

For your participations you will receive 30% of the total sum, while 10%
will be set aside for expenses incurred by the both parties, then the 60%
will be for me and my colleagues. If you deemed it right to assist us in
hitch free transaction, do not hesitate to reply me back through my private
email address: theophilBen@aol.co.uk

I look forward to receive positive response from you.

Sincerely,
Mr. Theophilus Benjamin.


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