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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:

Fraud email example:

From: William Douglas <"www."@space.ocn.ne.jp>
Reply-To: William Douglas <asahi-tyuuou@space.ocn.ne.jp>
Date: Thu, 12 Oct 2017 11:53:44 +0900 (JST)
Subject: Office Tel:+1 (509) 620-4868 Text or Call SMS.

The International Monetary Fund Annual Compensation from the USA.
The International Monetary Fund (IMF imfoffice240@gmail.com) is compensating some scam victims and
your email address was found in the scam victims list. This Western Union®office
has been mandated by the IMF to transfer your compensation to you via Western
Union®Money Transfer..call or text.

This is Mr. Michael Lee the money gram director am emailing you to inform
you about your fund which is brought today in our office by (IMF) office here
in the united states through the last discussion held today by the president
of Benin Republic and is about to transfer to You once we confirm with your
information so that we can give you the details of your fund at money gram
today.please confirm with current info to avoid the wrong transfer and indeed
here to save you well as instructed.

Such as
(Receivers name)............
(Country)....................
(Address)...................
(Phone Number)...........
(Your )................
(ID copy).............
(Your Email Address)...................

NOTE: That your payment files will be returned to the IMF within 24hours if
we did not hear from you because this was the instruction given to us by the
IMF office here in the USA. We will start the transfer as soon as we received your information
. You are hereby warned not to communicate or duplicate this message
for any reason what so ever because the US FBI is already on trace of the criminals
from Africa

NOTICE: To text or call this office for any question.
Sincerely,
Name: Mr. Michael Lee
Manager Director for Western Union California USA.
Office Tel:+1 (509) 620-4868 Text or Call SMS.

Anti-fraud resources: