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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.

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

Fraud email example:

From: "Douglas Winter" <douglaswinter03@gazeta.pl>
Reply-To: douglaswinter01@21cn.com
Date: Sat, 21 Jun 2008 00:12:24 +0000
Subject: From Douglas Winter


Douglas Winter
Branch Manager
Co-Operative Bank Plc
England United Kingdom
Email
douglaswinter01@21cn.com
Dear President/Ceo,

It is of utmost important that you take your time to read this mail after
which you can ask me any question you may deem necessary. I am a branch
manager of The Co-Operative Bank Plc based in England United Kingdom, in the
course of my job; I discovered an account, which has been dormant for the
past sixteen years. This account has been dormant for ten years before my
emergence as the branch manager.

I have carried out an investigation to know who the owner of this account is
and why the account has been left dormant, my investigation reveals that the
account belongs to an African Leader who visited the United Kingdom in 1992
opened an account with the sum of £4,000.00 in our bank.
The rest of the fund that entered the account was money being transferred
from the politicians home country. The account has been continuously
credited and never debited for once for a period of nine months. As at
December 1992, the account balance was totalling over $50,000,000.00, as the
account is a domiciliary one.

From December 1992 till date, no money has been credited or debited from the
account and this was what raised my curiosity. My finding has revealed that
the account was in the name of the politicians concubine who unfortunately
died in a car crash. The politician does not have any way of laying claim to
the money and the name used as the next of kin is fictitious.
To make the matter worst, the politician is facing a lot of challenges in
his country and as such is not interested in any thing that will bring his
name to the press as he is facing too much already.

You may ask why I decided to write you. I did because I want you to assist
me lay claim to the fund based on the fact that your name coincides with the
fictitious name used as next of kin. All I need is your readiness to assist
then I will tell you all that needs to be done.

You dont need to be afraid of any thing as I am an insider and will provide
you with every detailed information and clean plan on how we are going to go
about it. I will need to have your phone number so that we can talk more
elaborately. This is because I need to be assured of your confidentiality
and trust. Please get back to via my private emaill address
douglaswinter01@21cn.com

Yours faithfully,

Douglas Winter

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