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"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
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• 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:

• The following phrases in this message should put you on alert:
  • ",000,000" (they want you to be blinded by the prospect of quick money, but the only money that ever changes hands in 419 scams is from you to the criminals)
  • "certified bank draft" (Beware of any scheme that involves cashing checks or money orders and then wiring a portion of the funds somewhere - you'll be liable for the entire amount if the checks or money orders turn out to be fake, even after you have received and forwarded cash. If it's a lottery prize, remember that real lotteries do not pay large prizes by check. They wire the money directly to your bank account and you do not pay for that. Many scammers promise a large check only in order to then demand payment of courier fees for a fake courier service. )
• 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: World Delivery Express Ltd <worldxpdelivery@yahoo.co.th>
Date: Sun, 26 Aug 2007 01:22:32 +0700 (ICT)
Subject: Your email address has won you $4.6M


Attention: Maganhildi Kirschler

Your email address won you the lottery in the first winning category because the draw was a free ticket online email address sweeptakes and your email address won you the lottery in the category A which gets you entitled to claim the sum of $4.6m well I must state here that you need not be puzzled because the Uk Lottery Organization has been organising online and ticket free lottery in which all participants were selected randomly from World Wide Web site through computer draw system and extracted from over 100,000 companies and it is Approved by the British game Commision.

And your email address was selected among the first category winners and that left you as a winner of the uk lottery online draws and sweeptakes programme. The selection process was carried out through random selection in computerized email selection machine (TOPAZ) from a database of over 1,000,000 email addresses drawn from all the continents of the world.

The online draws was conducted by a random selection of email addresses from an exclusive list of 29,031 E-mail addresses of individuals and corporate bodies picked by an advanced automated random computer search from the internet. However, no tickets were sold but all email addresses were assigned to different ticket numbers for representation and privacy.

To enable us deliver your package all you have to do now is to provide us with your home or office address and direct phone line immediately for the quick delivering of your certified Bank draft of us$4.6m

Looking forward to hear from you.

Yours Faithfully
Mr. Mike Benson






Dear Sir,

Please excuse me but my English writing is not so totally perfect.

I may have already emailed you regarding a confidential matter. Would you please read the following email and tell me whether everything is in order? I am uncertain of the next action to take.

Thank you.

Maganhildi Kirschler

--- Forwarded email ---
$B?7$7$$%a!
______________________________________________________________
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Anti-fraud resources:

• What can you do when you receive 419 spam