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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:
- The following phrases in this message should put you on alert:
- "hundred thousand united states dollars" (they want you to be blinded by the prospect of quick money, but the only money that ever changes hands in 419 scams is from you to the criminals)
- ",500,000" (they want you to be blinded by the prospect of quick money, but the only money that ever changes hands in 419 scams is from you to the criminals)
- "00,000.00" (they want you to be blinded by the prospect of quick money, but the only money that ever changes hands in 419 scams is from you to the criminals)
- This email message is a 419 scam. Please see our 419 FAQ for more details on such scams.
Fraud email example:
From: Mr Terry Wilson <anarilikar00@gmail.com>
Date:
Subject:
Greetings,
My Name is MR TERRY WILSON, Executive Financial Officer of a BANK and I am
in need of a reliable foreigner to carry out this important deal.
An account was opened in my bank by one of my customer an engineer from
your country who made a fixed deposit of $11,500,000.00 (Eleven Million,
Five hundred Thousand United States Dollars) and never show up again and I
later discovered that he died with his entire family members on a plane
crash that occurred in Libya on the 12th of May 2010 and below is a link
for your view..
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/13/world/middleeast/13libya.html
Now I want to present a foreigner as next of kin to late Thomas so we can
make the claim and you can contact me if you are interested so I can give
you more detailed information about this transaction. The sharing of the
money will be shared in the ratio of 50% for me, 40% for you and 10% to
cover our expenses after the deal.
Now the total amount to be transferred is $12.2 million because of the
interest the fund has accumulated since 2010.
Please keep this absolutely confidential whether interested or not.
Thanks.
MR TERRY WILSON
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Anti-fraud resources:
