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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:
- An email address listed inside this email has been used in a known fraud before.
- 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.
- This email lists free webmail addresses. Use of such addresses is typical for scams. Lotteries, banks and any but the smallest of companies do not normally use such addresses. Criminals use them to anonymously send and receive email at Internet cafes.
- mrjonesleon@yahoo.com (email address has been used in a known fraud before)
Fraud email example:
From: "Mr Jones Leon" (may be fake)
Reply-To: <mrjonesleon@yahoo.com>
Date: Fri, 18 Jan 2013 15:39:09 -0500
Subject: Urgent Business Proposal.
I am Mr. Leon Jones; I work as the Fund Executive Manager with Fidelity Investment UK, the world leading Investment & Fund Management Institution based in UK/Channel Island. I have an investor under my portfolio with a closing balance of ?47.745,000.00 as his first initial deposit.
This investor died Four years ago leaving no WILL or AUTHORIZATION for Re- transfer of his investment and its proceeds to the INHERITOR. I have personally carried out an investigation on the subject matter that took me 12 months to finalize and was made to understand that the family or relatives of the investor knows nothing about his investment with fidelity and none have any records of all his deposits and investment with us, thereby creating an avenue for claiming of the said funds with its accrued interest on presentation of a trustworthy person that can stand as the INHERITOR to the deceased.
If you are interested i can present you as the INHERITOR with proper documentation that will qualify you to have the funds claimed and on doing this, our establishment will not question the release of the funds to you as i will make sure that we comply with the banking laws and ethics of claiming the investment in our establishment.
Our sharing ratio will be 50% 50%.Please contact me for more details if interested.
PLEASE REPLY ON MY ALTERNATIVE EMAIL: mrjonesleon@yahoo.com
Looking forward to hearing from you shortly.
Sincerely.
Mr. Leon Jones.
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Anti-fraud resources: