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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:
- "power of attorney" (with your bank details and a power of attorney form criminals sometimes empty bank accounts)
- This email message is a 419 scam. Please see our 419 FAQ for more details on such scams.
- Barristers (lawyers) mentioned in 419 scams are always fake.
Fraud email example:
From: "Fraud & Crime Unit" (may be fake)
Reply-To: <fraudcrimeunit@mail.com>
Date: Thu, 13 Apr 2017 02:56:56 -0700
Subject: Re: Confirmation
Dear sir,
We write to confirm if you have given Mr. Thomas of Australia the go ahead to act on your behalf and claim your funds that has been allocated to you after you were vetted among the some individuals who were scammed in Africa some years ago. Our investigation got you among individuals who were scammed through United Bank for Africa and other firms in Africa, and so we had discussion with governments of Africa and banks of Africa to compensated such people.
Unfortunately, after the meeting we had an application from one Mr. Thomas who claim you have instructed him to act on your behalf because of the nature of daily activities and business you are handling of recent, it makes you more busy to attend to some of your responsibilities. We thought it wise to confirm this from you because we requested for any power of attorney that you gave him to act on your behalf but he could not provide it and also the account provided did not have you complete details because it had different name and address.
Sir, advise us if you appointed Mr. Thomas to act on your behalf to claim your funds writing back to us immediately so that we can remit the funds to the account details already provided.
Regards.
Mr. Stevenson C. Walter
For: Fraud & Crime Unit.
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Anti-fraud resources:
