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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:
- "dear friend" (a common phrase found in 419 scams)
- "hundred thousand us 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)
- This email message is a next of kin scam.
Fraud email example:
From: "Mr. Taiho Bone" (may be fake)
Reply-To: <b_taiho@yahoo.com>
Date: Sun, 26 Jun 2011 00:56:35 +0700
Subject: Dear Friend
Dear Friend,
I am the manager of auditing and accounting department of Bank of Asia bank (CAB) here in cambodia . In my department we discovered an abandoned sum of US$20.5m Dollars ( TWENTY MILLION FIVE HUNDRED THOUSAND US DOLLARS) in an account that belongs to one of our foreign customer ( MR. ANDREAS SCHRANNER From Munich, Germany) Who died along with his entire family in jully 2000 in a plane crash for more information about the crash you can visit this site::(http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/859479.stm)
Since we got information about his death, we have been expecting his next of kin or relation to the deceased as indicated in our banking guidlings and laws but unfortunately we learnt that all his supposed next of kin or relation died alongside with him at plane crash leaving nobody behind for the claim.
It is therefore upon this discovery that I decided to make this business proposal to you and release the money to you as the next of kin or relation to the deceased for safety and subsequent disbursement since nobody is coming for it and we don't want this money to go into the bank treasury as unclaimed bill.
Trusting to hear from you immediately for more explainations.
Mr. Taiho Bone
Yours Faithfully,
MANAGER.
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Anti-fraud resources:
