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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: George Eke <georgeeke202@yahoo.com>
Date: Wed, 1 Mar 2006 08:07:31 -0800 (PST)
Subject: I need your assistance


Compliments of the reason,

Before I introduce myself, I wish to inform you that this letter is an urgent mail and I urge you to treat it serious. We want to transfer to an oversea account ($16,700.000.00 USD) Sixteen Million Seven Hundred Thousand United States Dollars) from one of the banks located in Africa.
I want to ask you, If you are not capable to quietly look for a reliable and honest person who will be capable and fit to provide either an existing bank account or to set up a new Bank a/c 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 of this important business ,I am trusting in you and believing in God that you will never let me down either now or in future.
I am mr George Eke a personal assistant to late Morris Thompson. During the course of his bank's last week auditing,it was discovered that since his death no one has come forward to lay claim to this funds.So the bank issued me a memo to provide his next of kin or forfeith the funds.
This account was opened with the bank in 1996 and since 1998 nobody has operated on this account again, after going through some old files in my records,I discovered that my late client died without a [Heir/WILL] hence the money is floating and if I do not remit this money out urgently it will be forfeited for nothing.
The owner of this account Mr. Morris Thompson an American and great industrialist and a resident of Alaska, who unfortunately lost his life in the plane crash of Alaska Airlines Flight 261 which crashsed on January 31st 2000, including his wife and only daughter leaving nobody as next of kin.
No other person knows about this account or any thing concerning it, the account has no other beneficiary and my investigation proved to me as well that the account is a secret account.
The total amount involved is sixteen million seven Hundred thousand United States Dollars only [$16,700.000.00] and we wish to transfer this money into a safe foreigners 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 a local person here, but to a foreigner who has information about the account, which I shall give to you upon your positive response.
I am revealing this to you with believe in God that you will never let me down in this business, you are the first and the only person that I am contacting for this business, so please reply urgently so that i will inform you the next step to take urgently.
At the conclusion of this business, you will be given 25% of the total amount,70% will be for us, while 5% will be for expenses both parties might have incurred during the process of transferring. I look forward to your earliest reply. PLEASE, TREAT THIS PROPOSAL AS TOP SECRET.It would be very business like if you email me once you receive this email.

Best Regards,

George Eke


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