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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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Some comments by the Scam-O-Matic about the following email:

Fraud email example:

From: "pius2_sister@cantv.net" <pius2_sister@cantv.net>
Date: Tue, 23 Feb 2010 17:46:39 -0430
Subject: Dearest one,,

Dearest one,

It is indeed my pleasure to write you this letter, which I believe will be a surprise to you as we have never met before, and I am deeply sorry if I have in any manner disturbed your privacy. Please forgive this unusual manner of contacting you, but this particular letter is of exceptional and very private nature.

I am master pius ndanema and my sister shirley, the children of late Gen. michael.ndanema. Our father was a very wealthy Gold Merchant in freetown the Capital of republic of sierra Leone all in west africa our father was poisoned by his business associates while our mother died when we were little children and my father took me so special because I am his only son.
Before the death of our father on 14th September 2006 in a hospital here in Cote D'ivoire, he secretly called me and told me that he has the sum of(USD $15 MILLION FIFTEEN MILLION U.S DOLLARS )which he deposited in a bank here in Cote D'ivoire.
He also made me understand that it was because of this money he was poisoned by his business associates while on a business trip with them and he instructed me to look for a foreign partner who will help me transfer this money out of this Cote Divoire and invest it for me, my purpose of contacting you is for you to help transfer this money to your country before this people who kill my father will kill me too
We are hiding in a local place here and I will compensate you with 20% of this money if you help us to transfer the money to your account l hope you will not betray the trust i have on you because this money is our only hope in this life and you will also help us to come over to your country to continue our education while you will invest our own share of the money for us.
I can assure you there is No Risk involve the money is an inheritance from my late father .
I am waiting to hear from you.
Best Regards,
Pius and shirley ndanema.

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