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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: Paul Maria <marianapaul4567@gmail.com>
Reply-To: Paul Maria <paulmariana834@yahoo.com>
Date: Tue, 2 Aug 2016 02:42:25 +0900 (JST)
Subject: Your Compensation


Hello dear, 

Happy new month. I'm Paul Maria from ABidjan, Ivory Coast. I just want to use this medium to thank you very much for your earlier assistance to help me in receiving my inheritance funds. I am happy to inform you that I have succeeded in transferring the funds with the help of a new friend from India. Everything was perfectly done because he travelled down here and we handle the transaction together. In appreciation of your earlier assistance to me i have decided to compensate you with the sum of $400,000 dollars. I did this simply to show appreciation to you for your kind support and assistance to me in the past. Presently, I am in india for investment project with my partner. I discussed with the bank manager on the best way to send the $400,000 usd to you before i travelled and he advised that the money should be transferred into an ATM Visa card so as to avoid any kind of questioning from your government and to avoid paying too much tax. He said that
the limit you can withdraw per day is $10,000 dollars. Reply for more detail.

Have a nice day.
Paul Maria.

Anti-fraud resources: