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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: "william .j" <worldbankplc7@gmail.com>
Reply-To: williamcmj06@gmail.com
Date: Thu, 23 Dec 2021 10:40:40 +0100
Subject: Mr Owen James
--
I'm Mr Owen James from Los Angeles CA, I'm the New Manager of Standard
Chartered Bank,
I want to let you know that we receive another email right now from a young
man called Mr. Jackson Robert, he said that you got an accident and died
yesterday that before you died in the hospital you gave him the power of
attorney to inherit your fund worth $18.9 million US Dollar in our custody
and he said that he is ready to pay for the VAT charge duty so that we can
hand over the fund to him, we need a confirmation to this and if we do not
hear from you within a couple of 72 hours we are going to take the action
by handing him over the fund.Remember to send us your Full information to
avoid wrong transfer such as:
Your full Name_______
Home Address: ______
State______
Country: ____
Nearest Airport Address___
Current E-mail Address____
Phone Number: _____
Photo ID Card ____
Occupation______
Best Regard
Mr Owen James
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Anti-fraud resources:
