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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:
- The following phrases in this message should put you on alert:
- "dear sir/madam" (a standard Nigerian greeting phrase)
- "00,000.00" (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 fake lottery scam. Consider the following facts about real lotteries:
- They don't notify winners by email.
- You can't win without first buying a lottery ticket.
- They don't randomly select email addresses to award prizes to.
- They don't use free email accounts (Yahoo, Hotmail, etc) to communicate with you.
- They don't tell you to call a mobile phone number.
- They don't tell you to keep your winnings secret.
- They will never ask a winner to pay any fees to receive a prize!
- This email lists mobile phone numbers. Use of such numbers is typical for scams because they allow criminals to conceal their true location. They can receive calls in an Internet cafe from where they send you emails, while pretending to be in some office.
- +447031863868 (UK, redirects to a mobile phone in another country)
Fraud email example:
From: "DIAMOND COMPANY LTD" <social@findemand.com>
Date: Mon, 13 Jan 2014 23:29:40 +0100
Subject: YOUR EMAIL SELECTED 2014 DIAMOND AWARD TO CLAIM CONTACT MR. DANIEL ERIC
Dear Sir/Madam,
This is to inform you that your email address has
won a prize money of Five Hundred Thousand Great Britain Pounds
(500,000.00 GB Pounds) for the 2014 International E-mail Draw which is
Organized by Diamond Company UK.
Diamond Company collects all the
email addresses of the people that are active online, among the
millions that subscribed and few from other e-mail providers. Six people
are selected and you are one of the Selected Winners.
SEND YOUR DETAILS TO
MR. DANIEL ERIC
E-MAIL: hdcliveuk@live.com
DIRECT LINE: +447031863868
Name..............
Your Country.........
Occupation........
Age................
Your Marital Status..........
Mobile Numbers°.................
Your Sex...........
Reference Number: HDC-UK/9150X43/14
For
security reasons, we advice all winners to keep this information
confidential from the public until your claim is processed and your
prize released to you. This is part of our security protocol to avoid
double claiming and unwarranted taking advantage of this program
Yours in service,
Mrs.Lucy Peter.
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Anti-fraud resources:
