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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: "Mr. Tunde Christopher" <smthf55@outlook.com>
Reply-To: successmba90@hotmail.com
Date: Thu, 21 Aug 2014 15:34:43 +0000
Subject: PARTNERSHIP
Sir,
I am Staff of NNPC (Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation) and I
have $6.5m USD for investment in your country, the question is will
you be able to handle transaction of such magnitude ? What area will
you want us to invest that will be lucrative since I have not been in
the world of business/investment before now ? This is confidentiality
demanding and capital intensive at the same time profitable as every
thing will be done without being harmful to the laws of this great
nation and that of yours. Get back to me for more details if you are
interested.
Thanks,
Tunde Christopher
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Anti-fraud resources:
