joewein.net   joewein.de LLC
fighting spam and scams on the Internet
Try our spam filter!
 Free trial for 30 days
   jwSpamSpy
Home
About Us
Spam
419/Nigeria
Fraud
Contact

"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.

 

 

Fraud email example:

From: "Mr. Frankline Olu Ezeh." <franklineolu@fastermail.com> (may be fake)
Reply-To: frankline_ezeh@clear.net.nz
Date: Fri, 4 Jun 2004 10:40:27 -0700
Subject: Letter From: Mr. Frankline Olu Ezeh. (Next of Kin Claims).

Dear partner,

I am Mr. Frankline Olu Ezeh the eastern auditor of United Bank for Africa Plc (U.B.A). There is an account opened in this bank in 1980 and since 1990 nobody has operated on this account again. After going through some old files in the records I discovered that if I do not remit this money out urgently it would be forfeited for nothing.

The owner of this account is Mr. Hartley S. Newman a foreigner and the manager of Granite Minnig Nig, a chemical engineer by profession and he died since 1990. No other person knows about this account or anything concerning it, the account has no other beneficiary and my investigation proves to me as well that his company does not know anything about this account and the amount involved is
(U.S. $25,000,000.00).

I want to transfer this money into a safe foreign account abroad but I don't know any foreigner, I am only contacting you as a foreigner because this money can not be approved to any local bank here but can only
be approved to any foreign account because the money is in U.S dollars and the former owner of the account is Mr. Hartley S. Newman and he was a foreigner too.

I will use my position and influence on other staffs to effect the legal approvals and onward transfer of this money to your account with appropriate clearance from foreign payment department. With assurance that
This money will intact pending my physical arrival.

At the conclusion of this business, you will be given 30% out of the total amount, 60% will be for me, while 10% will be for expenses, both parties might have incurred during the process of this transaction. I
Look forward to your earliest reply through my private e-mail address: frankline_ezeh@clear.net.nz

Yours truly,

Mr. Frankline Olu Ezeh.



Anti-fraud resources: