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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:

Fraud email example:

From: Tonya Jimmy <miss.pitcher@live.ca>
Reply-To: <tonya_09911@voila.fr>
Date: Fri, 14 Feb 2014 09:23:20 +0000
Subject: please help me




Dearest
I am Miss. Tonya Jimmy, am 20 years old Medical student, in
University of Sudan . I am the only child of my father of a blessed
memory by name Late Mr. Jimmy Lemi Milla was the rural development
minister in Sudan . You can read more about my father death in the BBC
news below website:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-12403620

I
am decided to contact you because of the maltreatment am receiving from
my step mother whom in partnership with my father only brother has
taken away all my fathers treasury and assets since the unexpected death
of my Father and also refused me access to everything and hid my
international passport and other valuable traveling documents, luckily
to me she couldn't discover about a secret deposit of $4.5m my late
father made with a bank when I traveled with him to Burkina-Faso on my
18th birthday and my name was used as next of kin and signed which is
the reason why I followed my father to Burkina-Faso. Due to the
maltreatment am receiving since the death of my father I managed to
escape to Ouagadougou Burkina-Faso through road, and am now seeking
hiding in a private charity organization under St Johns Catholic Church
here in Burkina-Faso.

I am in search of an honest and reliable
person who will help to relocate me in any of the western or any other
place in the world, for a better life and to continue my studies, I have
chosen to contact you after getting your email through a database, and I
believe you are a reliable person who will not let me down or betray my
trust, I know you may wonder why I am telling you about all this, even
without seeing or knowing you fully well, really something in me tells
me that you are a good person and I guess I am not wrong as I have no
choice.

Briefly, I will like to disclose little more about
myself to you and see if you can help me to relocate to your country so
as to continue with my studies and have a new life, and please this is a
little secret and I plead with you to keep it to yourself alone until
everything is properly arranged and executed, then I will come over to
join you in your country. I have the sum of $4.5Million as an
inheritance from my late father which I will like to invest in your
country with your help and am ready to give you 25% of the money as
thanking gift for your assistance after you have helped me to receive
the money and relocate to your country. I want you to understand that I
will not be able to make this claim because of my refugee status. I have to stop here till i hear from you.
Yours Sincerely,
Miss Tonya Jimmy

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