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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.

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Fraud email example:

From: "akin ayodele" <akin_ayo@msn.com>
Date: Sat, 23 Jul 2005 12:27:44 +0000
Subject: ESTATE OF YOUR LATE RELATIVE

Barrister AKIN AYODELE & Assocites
14 Freeway Lagos Island
Private Email-AKIN_AYO@walla.com




ATTENTION:

I am Barrister AKIN AYODELE a personal attorney to Late.Engr.Smith, a
Citizen of your country, who used to work with Zenon Oil Company here in
West Africa herein after, shall be referred to as my client.

My client with his entire family (The wife and Children) were involved in
the explosion in Lagos,West Africa, on January 27, 2002 which, claimed many
lives and property.
Unfortunately, my client and the family lost their lives in that disaster
that needed not to have happened. Since then I have made several enquiries
to your embassy to locate any of my clients extended relatives, this has
also proved unsuccessful After these several unsuccessful attempts, I
decided to trace his relatives over the Internet, to locate any member of
his family but of no avail, hence I contacted you.

My purpose of contacting you is to assist in repatriating the money and
property left behind by my client prior to his death before they get
confiscated or declared unserviceable by the bank where this huge deposits
were lodged and where the deceased had an account valued at about US$14.5
Million dollars. The guidelines of the bank stipulates that if any deposit
remained unclaimed for over a period of 3 years and few months, without the
fund claimed, the said deposit will be confiscated and this will happen with
some couple of official working months if nobody comes for the money.

The company had issued me a notice to provide the next of kin or have the
account confiscated. Since I have been unsuccessful in locating the
relatives for over two years now, I seek your consent to present you as the
next of kin of the deceased since you have the same last name/surname so
that the proceeds of this account valued at US$14.5 million dollars can be
paid to you and then you and me can share the money. 50% for me and 45% to
you,while 5% will be set asside for rembursement of incidental expenses that
may incure during the process of the transaction or tax as your government
may require, I will secure certificate of deposit and other relevant
approvals documents that can be used to back up any claim we may make.

All I require is your honest cooperation to enable us see this deal through.
I guarantee that this will be executed legitimately to protect you from any
breach of the law.

Please get in touch with me by email to enable us discuss further.Please
contact me through my alternative private.mailbox:(AKIN_AYO@walla.com}

Sincerely
Mr AKIN AYODELE

NB See the website of the bomb explosion below: -

http://www.disasterrelief.org/Disasters/020130Lagos3/index_txt.html.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/2718295.stm


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