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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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Fraud email example:

From: " ezramichael1965@handbag.com" <ezramichael1965@handbag.com>
Reply-To: michaelezraa@yahoo.co.uk
Date: Thu, 28 Jul 2005 15:17:05 +0100
Subject: AWAITING YOUR SOONEST REPLY

From: Mr.Michael Ezra
Email: michaelezraa@yahoo.co.uk

Attn:

I am Mr.Michael Ezra, working with the Standard Chattered Bank,
Accra-Ghana as the manager. On the course of the last year 2004 end of the
year's report,I discovered that my branch in which I am the manager made
one million, four Hundred and fifty Thousand US Dollars
(1,450.000.00)as an excess profit. This fund is currently lying unclaimed
in my bank NUSTRO ACCOUNT, awaiting the beneficiary who could be able to
provide the pin code of the deposited amount who will automatically receive
the fund as the owner/depositor.

As an officer of the bank, I cannot be directly connected to this money thus
I am impelled to request for your assistance to stand as the beneficiary
to receive this money into your bank account, I shall
provide you the pin-code of the deposit when the time comes since I am the
only person who knows about this deposit. You shall be given 30% of this
fund for your committed effort while 65% shall be for me and 5% shall be
for contengences. I do need to assure you that there is no risk involved
in this. It's going to be a bank-to-bank transfer. All I need from you is
to stand as the original depositor of this fund. I will appreciate your timely
response.

Yours truly,

Mr.Michael Ezra

__________________________________________________________________
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