joewein.net   joewein.de LLC
fighting spam and scams on the Internet
Try our spam filter!
Free trial for 30 days
  jwSpamSpy

Home
About Us
Spam
419/Nigeria
Fraud
Contact

"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:

Fraud email example:

From: "Mr. Timothy Ude" (may be fake)
Reply-To: <timude2016@gmail.com>
Date: Thu, 11 Aug 2016 13:27:26 +0100
Subject: Transfer Of Your First $12,000.00 Through Moneygram!

Greetings,

I am Mr. Timothy Ude, I have tried reaching you on mail all this while, but you fail to respond back to me, please be aware that your matter came to my desk which were dated since on the 29-11-2015 over 6 months ago, with the total fund of $5,250,000.00. Frankly speaking you are very lucky because you are going to receive your first (8) Ref-control numbers of $12,000 after responding to our mail, all this while your transfer had been stopped because it was under investigation of money laundry by the Ministry of Information and National Orientation and that was the reason your name were among those who were blacklisted, but now we have settled your problem and removed your name from the blacklist, so your funds is free for transfer to you now.

You will now be receiving $12,000 everyday in installment payment of $1,500 each until your total payment of $5,250,000 is completed, you will be receiving 8 reference numbers at a time, one for $1,500. The only thing we need from you is to obtain the (A.R.O) Authorization Release Order Certificate, which will reflect in any Money-Gram Office in your country, stating that you are not a party to money laundry activity, the (A.R.O) Authorization Release Order Certificate will cost you the sum of $269 only. Remember that this is the only charge for you to pay before your (8) Ref-control numbers of $12,000 will be released to you today for pick up without any delay.

You are to send the $269 to and also reconfirm your information to us as required below;

Receiver's Full Name:
Address:
City:
Zip code:
Country:
Telephone(Home And Cell):

Please try and make the $269 transfer as soon as possible so that we can proceed with your transfer immediately.

Yours Sincerely,
Mr. Timothy Ude
+229 68 51 84 36
Managing Director
Money-Gram Head Office Cotonou

Anti-fraud resources: