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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: "James Roberts" <mrr.jamesroberts@rediffmail.com>
Reply-To: <mrjamesroberts@rediffmail.com>
Date: Tue, 20 Mar 2012 05:05:42 -0500
Subject: Urgent From James
Happy New Year,
I am James Roberts,Fund Manager/Account Officer to embattled Former President Of Egypt Hosni Mubarak.I am contacting you regarding the assets belonging to my client worth USD$5 Million.This fund was deposited safely without the knowledge of anyone expect me and my client before contacting you to be our partner to receive and keep the fund on behalf of us.
As you may be aware that my client is facing political problems in his country and foreign Government have used the opportunity to seize all his assets and investments.I have contacted you to assist us to move this fund to you since no other person have knowledge of the existence of this fund except three of us.
I will give you further details of the fund release to you once i receive your response and assurance that you will not betray us.We will compensate you with 40% of the total fund at the end of the transaction after you have received the fund while 10% will be set aside for any expenses incurred.Do give us your telephone number including your full names and mailing address so as to enable us get in touch with you immediately and proceed accordingly.
Regards,
James Roberts
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Anti-fraud resources:
