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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: Vivian Dacoury <viviandacoury21@yahoo.com.ph>
Reply-To: viviandacoury1@yahoo.com
Date: Sun, 20 Nov 2011 03:41:58 +0800 (SGT)
Subject: Nice to meet you,
Nice to meet you,
My name is Miss; vivian I whisper my prayer today and went into search for a nice friend in the website. When I came across your contact/profile, my mind and heart told me to contact you for an intimate friendship. Indeed, I need a friend who is realistic, honesty and faithful in my life. The only way to reach me is through my private email Kindly accept my request so as to enable us share our feelings together. I quite believe that we can start from here since it takes one to know someone. I want you to understand that race or distance does not matter but loving and caring matters a lot in life. I am expecting your favorable response so that we can get to know each other better.
thanks
your vivian
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Anti-fraud resources:
