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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.

Click here to report a problem with this page.

 

 

Some comments about the following email:

Fraud email example:

From: Mr Jonathan Mann <newmann_newmann@yahoo.co.uk>
Reply-To: jonathanmann62@netscape.net
Date: Thu, 23 Mar 2006 19:18:07 +0000
Subject: A LUCRATIVE BUSINESS VENTURE/IT REQUIRES YOUR URGENT ASSISTANCE


Dear Sir/Madam
I am a member of staff of Natwest Bank here in the United Kingdom. I am
writing following an opportunity in my office that will be of immense
benefit to both of us.
In my department we discovered an abandoned sum of £23.5million British
Pounds Sterling (Twenty three million five hundred thousand British Pounds)
in
an account that belongs to one of our foreign customers Late Mr.
Morris Thompson an American who unfortunately lost his life in the
plane crash of Alaska Airlines Flight 261 which crashed on January 31
2000, including his wife and only daughter. You shall read more about
the crash on visiting this website.
http://www.cnn.com/2000/US/02/01/alaska.airlines.list/ and
http://www.nativefederation.org/history/people/mThompson.html
Since we got information about his death, we have been expecting his
next of kin or relatives to come over and claim his money because the
Bank cannot release the funds unless somebody applies for it as next
of kin or relation to the deceased as indicated in our banking
guidelines.
Unfortunately I learnt that his supposed next of kin being his only
daughter died along with him in the plane crash leaving nobody with
the knowledge of this fund behind for the claim. It is therefore upon
this discovery that I and two other officials in this department now
decided to do business with you and release the money to you as the
next of kin or beneficiary of the funds for safety keeping and
subsequent disbursement since nobody is coming for it and we do not
want this money to go back into Government treasury as unclaimed funds.
We agreed that 20% of this money will be for you as a foreign partner,
while the balance will be for me and my colleagues. I will visit your
country for the disbursement according to the percentages indicated
above once this money gets into your account. Please be honest to me
and trust is our watchword in this transaction.
Note this transaction is confidential and risk free. As soon as you
receive this mail you should contact me by return mail whether or not
you are willing to enter into this deal. In the event you are not
interested, I sincerely ask that you disregard this email and tell no
one about it. I am very careful on truncating my banking career should
you mention this to someone else. I hope you can be trusted in this
regard.
Please note that all necessary arrangement for the smooth release of
these funds to you has been finalised. We will discuss much in details
when I do receive your response.
Please in your response include your telephone number and fax number
for a better communication between us.
Best regards
Jonathan Mann
jonathanmann61@netscape.net

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