joewein.de LLC fighting spam and scams on the Internet

Try our spam filter! Free trial for 30 days

"419" Scam – Advance Fee / Fake Lottery Scam

• About the 419 (Advance Fee) scam
• "Is that email a scam?" - Check it online here!
  
• Frequently asked Questions (419 FAQ)
• Phone numbers used by 419 scammers
  (+225 +229 +234 +27 +31 +32 +34 +44 other)
• Company names mentioned in 419 spam:
  1 A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z
• Support our efforts to stop scams!
  
• How to report 419 spam to us
• What can you do when you receive 419 spam
  
  
• Spam archive, Daily index
  

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.

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:

• This email message is a fake lottery scam. Consider the following facts about real lotteries:
  
  1. They don't notify winners by email.
  2. You can't win without first buying a lottery ticket.
  3. They don't randomly select email addresses to award prizes to.
  4. They don't use free email accounts (Yahoo, Hotmail, etc) to communicate with you.
  5. They don't tell you to call a mobile phone number.
  6. They don't tell you to keep your winnings secret.
  7. They will never ask a winner to pay any fees to receive a prize!

Fraud email example:

From: MR EDWARD FRING <contact_agentedwardfring@yahoo.co.uk>
Date: Wed, 28 Mar 2007 19:18:39 +0100 (BST)
Subject: DEAR LUCKY WINNER (RESPOND)


Congratulations Lucky Winner,

On Behalf of the Screening Committee of United Kingdom National Lottery, I wish to formally inform you that you have successfully passed the Email Screening and Verification Matching Test conducted for all online winners in your winning in accordance with the United Kingdom National Lottery Terms and Conditions. Hence you are therefore cleared for payment by the verifications and fund release department at the United Kingdom National Lottery Headquarters and your winnings has been duly signed and approved for release to you by the legal attorney to the United Kingdom National Lottery.

As you already know, all winners for the online version of the United Kingdom National Lottery Online promotions were selected through a computer ballot system drawn from an exclusive list of 250,000 e-mail addresses of individual and corporate bodies listed online as part of our international promotion to promote international co-operation between the United Kingdom and other countries worldwide and I must say that you should count yourself extremely lucky to have emerged as one of our winners in this week's lucky dip sweepstakes and we do sincerely hope you will put part of your winnings into good use for community, educational and business development and also to render selfless services to the less privileged in your community.

The process for claiming your winnings has been made very simple so that by the end of one week at most, you are assured of having received your cash prize of the sum of £1,000,000.00 Pounds Sterling and all the legal documents backing your winnings. In the light of the above mentioned, you are to fill the beneficiary form so that we can process the claim of your winning.

Once again "Congratulation"

Regards,
Mr. Edward Fring


---------------------------------
New Yahoo! Mail is the ultimate force in competitive emailing. Find out more at the Yahoo! Mail Championships. Plus: play games and win prizes.

Anti-fraud resources:

• What can you do when you receive 419 spam