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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.
- This email message is a 419 scam. Please see our 419 FAQ for more details on such scams.
Fraud email example:
From: International Monetary fund <imfdebtmgt62@gmail.com>
Reply-To: imfdebtmgt1@gmail.com
Date: Tue, 28 Mar 2023 18:05:40 +0100
Subject: REPLY ASAP
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ATTENTION
The INTERNATIONAL MONETARY FUND (IMF) in conjunction with the WORLD
BANK has approved your pending beneficiary fund and hereby brings this
information to your notice thus,
You are required to contact this office within 48 hours of receiving
this notification as your recipient Email was reflected on our central
database. On contacting us, endeavor to confirm your full name and
contact telephone number to enable us to normalize the documents in
your name and advise you on how to make your claim.
Yours faithfully,
Dr. Robert Carter
Coordinator, International Settlement Unit
Tel: +1 202 7737588
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Anti-fraud resources:
