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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)
- This email message is a 419 scam. Please see our 419 FAQ for more details on such scams.
Fraud email example:
From: Son Choor <sh.choor@everyday.com.kh>
Reply-To: sh.choor@yahoo.com
Date: Sat, 31 Mar 2012 14:03:00 -0400
Subject: Your Mail/Business Proposal.
Dear Friend,
I am writing to you after proper consideration that telephone conversation may not be ideal medium to contact you due to the very nature of this letter. I hope you do not get offended as I do not know you personally but after reading this mail, you will understand why I contacted you.
My name is Choor Son. I'm a project director with an NGO that is responsible for the caring of street children in Cambodia. I do not solicit for fund, neither do I want to waste your time. I rather solicit for your cooperation to participate in a good business that will benefit both of us and in particular help these children.
As a project director with an NGO, we do get classified donors once in a while from some South East Asia businessmen. One of them was Zhao Mingjie, head of Lu's Kaifeng business in China and cousin to a multimillionaire. Some years back he moved some cash which is in millions US dollars from England to China via a Cambodia bank with the help of my organization. Unfortunately that fund never got to China before he was sentenced to death for some state crime and that fund remained unclaimed till date in a Cambodian bank.
Please see: http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2006-05/18/content_4565701.htm
I want to invite you to work with me and lets get this fund out of the bank here. I have the secrets and the codes of deposit and this information are not know to any other person.I will guide you on how we can benefit from this opportunity without any risk and problems. Please reply as soon as you get this mail with your direct line and email for me to get back to you with the full details which is very private.
Kind Regards
Choor Son
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Anti-fraud resources:
