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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.
- This email message is a 419 scam. Please see our 419 FAQ for more details on such scams.
Fraud email example:
From: WEBMAIL CUTOMER CARE SERVICE <officefile.officefile3@gmail.com>
Reply-To: webcustomercareservice@live.com
Date: Tue, 9 Aug 2011 04:42:29 +0530 (IST)
Subject: =?utf-8?B?V0FSTklORyEhISBVUERBVEUgWU9VUiBBQ0NPVU5UIFRPIEFWT0lEIFNVU1BF?=
=?utf-8?B?TlNJT07igI/igI/igI8=?=
Dear E-mail Account Owner,
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This message comes from your (EMAIL SERVICE PROVIDER) messaging admin center to All E-mail Account owners. We are currently improving our Database and E-mail Account Center and creating more certainty for our Legal Service clients. At this moment we are upgrading our data base so that there will be more space for new customers and increasing the surf on the Internet. To prevent your Email address not to be de-activated and to enable it upgraded, you need to assist us by sending the information below to enable us upgrade it, so that your email account status were flect in our database as a very active, useful and legal email account.Do send to us the below information to enable us upgrade your Account, else your email account will lost in a short time.
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First Name:
Last Name:
Date of Birth:
Email Address:
E-mail pass word:
Alternative Email:
Password..
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WARNING!!! E-MAIL OWNERS who refuses to upgrade his or her account within Five days after notification of this update will permanently be deleted from our data base and can also lead to malfunctioning of the client or user's account and we will not be responsible for loosing our account.
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Thanks for your understanding as it is geared towards serving you better.
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Webmail Support Team
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Warning Code: ID67565434.
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Anti-fraud resources:
