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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: "Charles Shaalan" <alitoheee1@yahoo.co.uk> (may be fake)
Reply-To: csproposal@yahoo.co.uk
Date: Thu, 29 Sep 2005 10:09:20 +0100
Subject: Proposal

Dear Sir,
I sincerelly apologise for intruding into
your email inbox,please forgive me.I am
desperately looking for some one from your
country who I can cooperate with on a
business relationship.Its all about
investment.I am a politician here and
have a reasonable amount of money I have
safed in the past.I have a lot of
political enemies who are presently
looking for a way to drag me down.I here
they have been searching from bank to
bank to see if they could get hold of any
information concerning me. Well,wisdom
helped me to know that such will be the
case with my enemies and I had to make
the deposit in disguise else where which
is not a bank.Also the institution with
the deposit does not know that what I
have kept all these months with them was
a lot of money.Recently,I sense that if I
do not relocate the funds,I might loose
them.That is why I am contacting you.This
is between us and know one should know
about it. I am aware of the activities of
some individuals parading themselves as
having money and in turn taking your own
money (SCAMS).Please note that you are not
required to pay any money for this
transaction.I have an investor who will
give me the adquate loan I shall need for
the evacuation of the funds to your
country.I have also worked out strategies
to achieve this goal.If you are willing
to assist me,please respond immediately
with your full name and address and
contact telephone numbers.I shall open up
in details as soon as I ascertain your
interest to be a part of this project. I
will stop at this untill I hear from you.

Charles Shaalan.
drkenn_owusu@excite.com


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