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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 message is a next of kin scam.
- This email lists free webmail addresses. Use of such addresses is typical for scams. Lotteries, banks and any but the smallest of companies do not normally use such addresses. Criminals use them to anonymously send and receive email at Internet cafes.
- manpetersxx@hotmail.com (Hotmail; can be used from anywhere worldwide)
Fraud email example:
From: Manuel Peters <teamonline15@amicable.biz>
Date: Sun, 28 Mar 2010 08:20:56 -0700 (PDT)
Subject:
Hello,
I am Mr. Manuel Peters, Senior Staff with a bank in Republic of Benin. I got your contact from the internet while searching for a reliable someone to contact for this mutual benefit transaction. I decided to contact you due to the urgency of this transaction. During the course of our auditing we discovered a floating fund in a domiciliary account opened in the bank in 2000 and since 2004 nobody has operated on this account and after going through some old files in the records we discovered that the owner of the account who is a foreigner died in Madrid Bombing of 11th of March 2004 without any traceable next of kin hence the dormant nature of the account and if nobody come to claim this funds it will be re- channel to our government coffers as unclaimed funds.
I am only contacting you as a foreigner that can handle transactions maturely because this funds cannot be approved for a local account as the depositor is a foreigner. The fund can only be approved to a foreigner or into a foreign account. Now, I need your full co-operation to make this project a success. There is no risk at all. The paperwork for this transaction will be done by an Attorney and my position guarantees the successful execution of this transaction.
If you are interested reply only to my private email below and I shall provide you with more details on what to do: manpetersxx@hotmail.com
Yours faithfully,
Mr. Manuel Peters
Email: manpetersxx@hotmail.com
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Anti-fraud resources:
