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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:
- "fiduciary agent" (real lotteries do not use a "claim agent" / "fiduciary agent")
- "claims agent" (real lotteries do not use a "claim agent" / "fiduciary agent")
- "abidjan" (a location commonly mentioned in 419 scams)
- 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!
Fraud email example:
From: Canadian Lotto <alicebright22@yahoo.com>
Reply-To: Canadian Lotto <canadianlotto2015@gmail.com>
Date: Mon, 10 Aug 2015 15:56:04 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: Congratulations!!
 Congratulations!!
This is to inform you that you have won a prize money of Eight HundredAnd Twenty Thousand Dollars (USD 820,000.00) for the month of August2015 Prize Promotion which is Organized by YAHOO AWARDS & WINDOWSLIVE.
YAHOO! collects all the email addresses of the people that are activeonline, among the millions that subscribed to Yahoo, Hotmail and Gmailand few from other e-mail providers. Six people are selected monthlyto benefit from this promotion and you are one of the SelectedWinners.
PAYMENT OF PRIZE AND CLAIM
Winners shall be paid in accordance with his/her Settlement Centre.Yahoo Prize Award must be claimed no later than 15 days from date ofDraw Notification. Any prize not claimed within this period will beforfeited.
Stated below are your identification numbers:
BATCH NUMBER: YPA/07/APA-43658REFERENCE NUMBER:2007234522PIN: 1207
These numbers fall within the Cote d'Ivoire Location file, you arerequested to contact our fiduciary agent in Abidjan and send yourwinning identification numbers to him;
Agent Name: MR GOODLUCK VICTORE-Mail: canadianlotto2015@gmail.comTel: +22556887299You are advised to send the following information to your Claims Agentto facilitate the release of of your fund to you.
1. Full name...............................2. Country..................................3. Contact Address.....................4. Telephone Number.................5. fax Number............................5. Marital Status.........................6. Occupation.............................7. My Date of birth......................8. Sex.................................
Congratulations!! once again.
Yours in service,
Dr. (Mrs.) Edith Barth-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------WARNING!
Do not tell people about your Prize Award until your money issuccessfully handed over to you to avoid disqualification that mayarise from double claim.
You may also receive similar e-mails from people potraying to be otherOrganizations or Yahoo Inc. This is solely to collect your personalinformation from you and lay claim over your winning. In event thatyou receive any e-mail similar to the notification letter that wassent to you, Kindly delete it from your mail box and give no furthercorrespondence to such person or body.
Yahoo shall not be held responsible for any loss of fund arising fromthe above mentioned.
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Anti-fraud resources:
