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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: "Mr.Ludovick P.Johnson" <ludiojo1992@yahoo.com>
Reply-To: mr.ludovic@inmail24.com
Date: Mon, 25 Sep 2006 17:20:04 +0200
Subject: Re:Hello.


ATTENTION: Dear Friend,

I MAKE THIS APPEAL WITH THE UNDERSTANDING THAT ANY FACTS OR OPINION EXPRESSED BY ME ARE GIVING IN CONFIDENCE AND SOLELY FOR YOUR PERSONAL INFORMATION AND USE.

I am Mr.Ludovick P.Johnson,the manager of bill and exchange at the foreign remittance department of my Bank. In my department I discovered an abandoned sum of US$8.5M,(Eight Million, Five Hundred Thousand US Dollars) with account number 14-2558-5976 that belongs to one of our foreign customers who died along with his wife and only daughter in a plane crash of Alaska Airlines Flight number 261 which crashed on 31 January, 2000. You shall read more about the crash on visiting this site http://www.cnn.com/2000/US/02/01/alaska.airlines.list/ The owner of this account is Mr. Morris Thompson an American and great industrialist and a resident of Alaska.

It is therefore upon this discovery that I now decided to make this business proposal to you and for our bank to release the money to you. You have to follow the instruction which I will send to you as the next of kin or relation to the deceased for safety and subsequent disbursement since nobody is coming for it and I don't want this money to go into our bank treasury as unclaimed bill.

The banking law and guidelines here stipulates that if such money remained unclaimed after Three years, the money will be transfered into the bank treasury as unclaimed fund. The money has now stayed more than three years and I am preparing documentaion to prove that this money has been transfered to our bank treasury. It will be between me and you only that will know that the money is not transfered into our treasure. The request of foreigner as next of kin in this transaction is occasioned by the fact that the customer was a foreigner and a Senegalese cannot stand as next of kin to a foreigner.

In appreciation of your assistance, I am offering you 30% of the total sum. 5% for contingencies (cost of transfer/other charges) likely to be incurred during the course of transaction, while the remaining 65% is for me.

Upon receipt of your reply, I will send to you by fax or email the text of the application which you will complete and forward to our bank asking for this money to be paid to you as the next of kin to Mr. Morris Thomson. I will not fail to bring to your notice that this transaction is hitch-free and that you should not entertain any fear as all required arrangements have been made for the transfer.

You should contact me immediately as soon as you receive this mail through the above altentive email at mr.ludovic@inmail24.com or you call me directly at +221 99 66 183.

PLEASE DO NOT HESITATE TO CONTACT ME IMMEDIATELY SHOULD YOU CONSIDER MY URGENT REQUEST.

Yours Faithfully,

Mr Ludovick P.Johnson

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