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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 by the Scam-O-Matic about the following email:

Fraud email example:

From: "timi silver" <timiaudgeneral26@hotmail.com>
Reply-To: drsilvertimi@myway.com
Date: Wed, 09 Aug 2006 00:27:45 +0000
Subject: IMPORTANT.

From Auditor Dr Silver Timi,
120,Paul Kruger Street,
Boksburg South,
Johannesburg Province.

Warmest greetings to you. Do not be perplexed with this note, I want to
solicit your attention to transfer to overseas the sum of Twenty Six
Million United States Dollars (26,000,000.00 USD) from a Bank in Africa.

I am Dr.Silver Timi, the Auditor General of prime banks here South
Africa, during the course of our auditing, I discovered a floating fund in
an account opened in the bank in 1990 and since 1993 nobody hasoperated on
this account again.
After going through some old files in the records I discovered that the
owner of the account died without a [heir] hence the money is floating
and if I do not remit this moneyout urgently it will beforfeited for
nothing.

The owner of this account was a foreigner, a miner and an
industrialist. He made millions of dollars before he died misteriously.
Since 1993 no other person knows about this account or any thing concerning
it.
The amount involved is (USD 26M) Twenty sixmillion United States
Dollars only. I want to first transfer $6,000.000 [Six million United States
Dollar] from this money into a safe foreigners account abroad before the
rest, but I don't know any foreigner.
Also send your private telephone number and fax number including the
full details of the account to be used for the deposit.

I need your strong assurance that you will never let me down in this
business proposition. With my influence and the position of a bank
official whom is working in our favour we can transfer this money to any
foreigner's reliable account which you can provide with assurance that this
money will be intact pending our physical arrival in your country for
sharing.
The bank official will destroy all documents of transaction immediately
we receive this money leaving no trace to anyplace and to build
confidence.

I therefore request that you send me your account details(or urgently
open a new account without any money in it provided it can receive money)and
your telephone nos. both home and office for easy communication.
State the account as below:
The name of the Bank:
The address of the Bank:
The beneficiary name and account number:

At the conclusion of this business, you will be given 35% of the total
amount, 60% will be for me, while 5% will be for expenses both parties
might have incurred during the process of transferring.

Best Regards,
Dr.Silver Timi.

_________________________________________________________________
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