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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:
- "from the desk of" (a common phrase found in 419 scams)
- "with your full names" (a common phrase found in 419 scams)
- "huge amount of money" (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)
- "huge sum of money" (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 419 scam. Please see our 419 FAQ for more details on such scams.
Fraud email example:
From: "PETER MARRIOT" <britishfinancemonitoringunit17@yahoo.com.ph>
Reply-To: britishfinance2000@rediffmail.com
Date: Fri, 24 Aug 2012 00:06:14 +0600 (BDT)
Subject: PLEASE RESPOND NOW
THE BRITISH FINANCE MONITORING UNIT
Paulerspury
Northamptonshire
NN12 7NA
United Kingdom
>From the Desk Of Mr. Peter Marriott.
Executive Director
British Finance Monitoring Unit.
Be inform that it has come to our notice that a huge sum of money has
been credited in your name for transfer and is currently floating in
our data base.
Under the stipulated Law of the Government of Great Britain and other
member countries of the United Nations, any huge amount of money that
has been found in the international computer data system waiting to be
transferred without claims for a period of 6 months shall be
confiscated and forfeited to the United Nations account.
We do hereby ask you to contact this office immediately with your Full
Names/Contact Address/Occupation/international Passport or Driver's
lincense/Telephone and Fax Numbers for the release of your funds
within the 3 days of this notice or consider your fund confiscated.
We appreciate your urgent co-operation.
Sincerely yours,
Peter Marriott
British Finance Monitoring Unit.
[This e-mail contains confidential information intended only for the
addressee(s). Information in or attached to it may be privileged,
confidential or protected by law. If you are not the addressee (or a
person responsible for delivering this transmission to the addressee)
you are strictly prohibited from reading, copying, disseminating or
distributing it. If you have received this e-mail in error please
delete it and any attachments from your system and destroy any print
outs you may have made. Thank you
--
This message has been scanned for viruses and
dangerous content by MailScanner, and is
believed to be clean.
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