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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: Simon Lowth <wc11@htdyd1y.net>
Reply-To: <simonlowth01@gmail.com>
Date: Tue, 19 Jul 2016 08:17:51 +0100
Subject: Business Relationship
Greetings
I am Capt.Joseph Berry of the United States Army. I was gifted with some cash and gold bars after saving the life of a wealthy Sheikh at the sub-station where i am deployed in Afghanistan. I do not want my superior officers to know about this so they won't take it away from me. I rather send it to someone i don't know on a mutual agreement than let them seize and keep it for themselves and leave me with nothing.
We shall discuss about investing the fund, probably in your area of business or something lucrative either home or abroad. But you must keep this correspondence to yourself because of my position . Kindly indicate your interest in assisting me in this venture. I will send you more details on how we proceed .
Kindly reply as soon as possible.
Best regards,
Capt Joseph Berry
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Anti-fraud resources:
