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"419" Scam – Advance Fee / Fake Lottery Scam

• About the 419 (Advance Fee) scam
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• Phone numbers used by 419 scammers
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• 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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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:
  • "money laundering" ("anti-terrorist", "anti-money laundering" or "drug-free" certificates are a common way for criminals in fake lottery scams and other Advance Fee scams to get you to send money to them. There are no such certificates in the real banking world. )
  • "processing fee" (this will cost you money - be careful with upfront payments to anyone you only know through email, especially if they promise you a lot of money. Never ever send money by Western Union or MoneyGram to people you do not know personally. )
  • "deadline" (scammers rush victims so they don't have time to think properly)
  • "affidavit " (Barristers (lawyers) mentioned in 419 scams are always fake.)
  • "foreign remittance department" (Banks mentioned in 419 scams are always fake (real banks don't communicate using mobile phones or free webmail addresses))
  • "non-resident tax" (Tax offices mentioned in 419 scams are always fake. Even after you pay their fake tax demands you will still not receive the non-existent funds you have been promised. )
  • "come down to the uk" (these scammers pretend to be based in the UK, but they are really in Africa)
• 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!
• This email lists mobile phone numbers. Use of such numbers is typical for scams because they allow criminals to conceal their true location. They can receive calls in an Internet cafe from where they send you emails, while pretending to be in some office.
  • +447031862931 (UK, redirects to a mobile phone in another country)

Fraud email example:

From: Robert David <robertxdavid@live.com>
Date: Wed, 23 Apr 2008 05:13:50 -0400
Subject: RE: PROCESSED



Address: 20 North Bridge
Edinburgh,
EH1 1SD,
United Kingdom
Name: Interbank payment service
Foreign Remittance Department:

Email: robertxdavid@live.com
robertxdavid@textnwin.org

TEL: +44-703-186-2931
TEL: +44-703-186-2949
FAX: +44-131-777-8178


Dear Ma. Elen Grace Llaguno

You are welcome to the Global Text and Win Promotion. Payment Office an affiliate of the National Lottery. I am pleased to be at your service and you have been officially cleared for payment by the Verifications Department at the headquarters of the Global Text and Win Promotion.

The original copy of your winning certificate, together with a covering document (Money Laundering protection and Letter of Affidavit for Claims) stating that the money was obtained legally through the Global Text and Win Promotion is ready and has been sent to the tax agency for processing.

With regards to you collecting your money, there are different options that are available for you to collect it.

The first option that we have is the bank transfer, this is much easier and very convenient, with this method, you will be advice to contact our subsidiary sponsored bank which is responsible for the remittance/transfer of your winning sum directly to your personal account in your country within 24 hours, and you will have to activate an account in the bank, as soon as you activate the account, the bank will provide for you a login information ( username and password ) , with your login, you can access your account at the bank, you will see the amount you have in the account and also you can make direct transfer to your personal account in your country within few minutes.

Secondly, you can as well come down to the UK to collect your winnings personally. If you are coming down to the UK, you will have to notify us, so we can make arrange for your pick up at the airport.

And when coming to the UK, there is a processing fee that you will have to come along with, we have checked and it showed that you are not a resident of the United Kingdom, so we will need to assist you to obtain a Non-Resident tax certificate, which would cost you the sum of £900 and the processing fee is of £50, it total you will have to pay of £950, but if you want to obtain the Non-Resident tax certificate yourself directly from the tax office, the tax office will ask you to pay the sum of £1900, but if we assist you in obtaining the Non-Resident tax certificate, you will pay less, but if you can not come to the UK, and you want to use the bank transfer to get your winning to you, then you will be advised to send the processing down.

I know you would have prefer that the processing fee and the obtaining of the Non-Resident tax certificate be deducted from the amount you won, but your prize is protected by a hardcover insurance policy, which makes it impossible to deduct any amount from the money before it has been remitted to you. This means that no charges can be deducted from the prize and hence must be provided by you before your prize is transferred to you, and secondly you are the only person that is liable to receive the money and not until the approval is received from the tax office, the money cannot be transferred or deducted.

This is in accordance with section 13(1) (n) of the national gambling act as adopted in 1993 and amended on 3rd July 1996 by the constitutional assembly. This is to protect winners and to avoid misappropriation of funds Also be reminded that the deadline for the claiming of winnings is exactly two weeks after the receipt of this email. After this period, your cash prize will be deemed to have been forfeited by you and will be reused in the drawings of the next edition of the lottery.

I hope to hear from you soon.
Good luck and Congratulations once again.
Regards,
Mr. Robert David
Head of Payment Office






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Anti-fraud resources:

• What can you do when you receive 419 spam