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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:
- "from the desk of" (a common phrase found in 419 scams)
- "(efcc)" (This name is often mentioned in money recovery scams (re-scam): the real EFCC does not contact victims to offer to get their money back because that is near impossible. )
- This email message is a 419 scam. Please see our 419 FAQ for more details on such scams.
Fraud email example:
From: "Mr.Ibrahim Magu" <unitedubabank1@gmail.com>
Reply-To: ibrahimmagu600@aol.com
Date: Mon, 23 Aug 2021 04:29:42 -0700
Subject: I need your immediate update
FROM THE DESK OF EFCC CHAIRMAN
This is chairman of economic financial crimes commission (EFCC)
Ibrahim Mustafa Magu,an investigating authority against frauds related
cases in Nigeria . I am writing to you regarding the case of sum of
$4.5million USD discovered in possession of manager of united bank for
Africa, according to our investigations on the source, we discovered
that the money was awarded to you by International Monetary Fund,we
made him speak on how he acquired such large amount of money on his
private bank account but after much threatens he confessed and your
name was mentioned to be the beneficiary,further investigations we
made we were able to ascertain that it was an award from International
Monetary Fund Organization and he is the manager in charge to handle
the transaction but according to him they tried several times to reach
you on the email but they couldn`t get your response and that was one
of the reasons he decided to keep the money to himself. We want you to
understand that we will supervise the transaction until the money is
paid to you as directed by International Monetary Fund but only your
obligations is to send them fee to wire the money to your bank account
and nothing more.We want you to understand that we will supervise the
transaction until the money is paid to you as directed by
International Monetary Fund but only your obligations is to send them
fee to wire the money to your bank account and nothing more.We want
you to understand that we will supervise the transaction until the
money is paid to you as directed by International Monetary Fund but
only your obligations is to send them fee to wire the money to your
bank account and nothing more.
Ibrahim Mustafa Magu
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Anti-fraud resources:
