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. Michael Williams " <mr.michaelwilliams05@gmail.com>
Date: Wed, 20 Jul 2022 10:45:25 -0700
Subject: Dear friend!

My name is Mr. Michael Williams, I am a newly promoted Branch Manager
for a Bank here in Ghana, West Africa, I got your information during
my internet research. It may interest you to know that I am a man of
PEACE and I don't want problems, I just hope we can help each other.
If you do not want this business offer, please forget about it as I
will not contact you again.

I have packaged a financial transaction that will benefit both of us,
as the Branch Manager of the Bank, it is my duty to send a Financial
Report to my headquarters in the capital Accra at the end of each
year. In the course of the last year-end report 2021, I discovered
that my branch where I am a manager has made an excessive profit of
[$12,500,000 million dollars] that my head office is not aware of and
will never know of. I have since placed this fund in a MISCELLANEOUS
account.

As a bank employee, I cannot be directly linked to this money, so this
informed me that I have contacted you to work together so that you can
help me and receive this fund in your bank account in your country to
SHARE.

I am offering you 45% of the total fund while you keep 55% for me in
your bank account until I join you in your country to share/invest my
own share of the funds or better yet we can join a joint partnership
venture, I appreciate it very much.

If you agree with this proposal, I intend to split the fund with you
in two equal parts. If you are interested, please reply to me. I will
give you more details.


Sincerely,
Mr. Michael Williams

Anti-fraud resources: