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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: "Dr Woodrow" <dr.woodrow@infohq.com> (may be fake)
Date: Sat, 12 Nov 2005 18:03:01 -0800
Subject: Good Day.

From the desk of
Dr. Woodrow
Kuala Lumpur
Malaysia.

Attn: Sir,

TRANSFER OF FIVE MILLION THREE HUNDRED THOUSAND UNITED STATES DOLLARS

I want to transfer ($5,300,000.00 USD)Five Million Three Hundred
Thousand United States Dollars from a Bank here in Kuala Lumpur,
Malaysia to oversea account.First, I must solicit your strictest confidence in this

transaction.This is by virtue of it's nature as being utterly confidential.I am sure

and have confidence of your ability and reliability to prosecute a transaction of

thisgreat magnitude.I solicit your assistance to be presented as the Next of Kin to
a deceased customer in facilitating the transfer of the said amount into your safe

account for unward investment.You can either provide us with an existing account or
to set up a new Bank account immediately to receive this money, even an empty a/c can

serve to receive this money, as long as you will remain honest to me till the end for

this important business trusting in you and believing that you will never let me
down either now or in future.I am the personal account officer to a great late
INDUSTRIALIST who operated an account in my Bank here in Malaysia. The account was

opened in 1998 and he died in the year 2000 without a written or oral WILL and since

then nobody has operated on this account again hence the money is floating and if
I do not remit this money out urgently it will be forfeited for nothing since our
bank have been sold on Wednesday, 19 June 2005 to another bank and the management of

the bank is now ready to release the fund to any foreigner who has the correct

information of the account before fully handing over the management to the new

bank.The owner of this account is a foreigner and no other person knows about this

account or anything concerning it, the account has no other beneficiary. My

investigation through the National immigration department proved to me as well that
he was single as at the point of his entry into Malaysia.The amount in this account
is USD($5,300,000 USD) FIVE Million Three Hundred Thousand United States Dollars

only.As a matter of fact,
I have decided to transfer this fund abroad for investment. Your assistance as a

foreigner is necessary because the management of the bank will welcome any foreigner

who has correct information to this account which I will give you immediately, if you

are interested in this business.There is no risk to this business. With my position

and my personal contact

with the manager of the bank,the money will be transferred to any account you can

provide with assurance that this money will be intact pending our arrival in your

country for disbursement. I am only contacting you as a foreigner because this
money can not be approved to a local person here, but can only be approved to any

foreigner who has the correct information of the account which I will provide to

you.This is based on the fact that the deceased customer was a foreigner.Upon
receipt of your response,on your interest in this transaction,I shall keep you
abreast on how this transaction will be executed.At the conclussion of the transfer

you will take 10% for your honest committment and positive contributions to enhance

that the transaction succeeds,and the remaining 85% for me my coleague while 5% is
for expenses that might occur during process. I intend to invest in any area you
deem profitable. As soon as I hear from you,and upon your strong assurance that
you will not let me down once the fund goes into your account I will then start to
process the transfer of the fund to your account without further delay. Contact me

urgently for further detail.

Yours Faithfully,
Dr. Woodrow

dr.woodrow@infohq.com


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