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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: "Ali Usman" <aliusman1@jabster.pl>
Reply-To: mr.ali_usman2020@yahoo.fr
Date: Thu, 4 Sep 2008 09:20:39 +0000
Subject: FROM MR ALI USMAN.


*FROM MR ALI USMAN.
BANK OF AFRICA (BOA)
BILL AND EXCHANGE DEPARTMENT,
OFFSHORE OFFICE,OUAGADOUGOU BURKINA-FASO.

Dear,

I know that this letter may come to you as a surprise, I got your contact
address from the computerized search. My name is Mr Ali Usman. I am the Bill
and Exchange (assistant) Manager of Bank of Africa Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso
.

In my department I discovered an abandoned sum of nine million five hundred
thousand United State of American dollars ($9.5MILLION U..S.A DOLLARS) in an
account that belongs to one of our foreign customer Mr Kurt Kuhle from
Alexandra Egypt who died along with his family in Siber airline that crashed
into sea at Isreal on 4th October 2001.

Since I got information about his death I have been expecting his next of
kin to come over and claim his money because we can not release it unless
somebody applies for it as the next of kin or relation to the deceased as
indicated in our banking guidelines, but unfortunately we learnt that all
his supposed next of kin or relation died alongside with him in the plane
crash leaving nobody behind for the claim.

It is therefore upon this discovery that I decided to make this business
proposal to you and release the money to you as next of kin or relation to
the deceased for safety and subsequent disbursement since nobody is coming
for it because I don't want the money to go into the bank treasury as
unclaimed Bill. The banking laws and guidelines here stipulates that if such
money remains unclaimed after seven years the money will be transferred into
the bank treasury as unclaimed fund.

The request of foreigner in this transaction is necessary because our late
customer was a foreigner and a Burkinabe can not stand as next of kin to a
foreigner. I have agreed that 33% of this money will be for you as foreign
partner in respect to the provision of a foreign account, 2% will be set
aside for expenses that might occurred during the business and 65% would be
for me, after which I shall visit your country for disbursement according to
the percentages indicated.

Therefore to enable the immediate transfer of this fund to you as we
arranged you will furnished me with a good receiving account details where
the money will be transferred, your private telephone and fax number for
easy communication.

Upon receipt of your reply I will send to you by fax or e-mail a text of the
application which you shall retype and fax to our foreign remittance manager
for easy execution of the transaction.

I will not fail to bring to your notice that this transaction is 100%
hitch-free on both side as all required arrangement has been made for the
transfer. Please I would like you to keep this transaction confidential and
as a top secret as you may wish to know that I am a Bank official.

Trusting to hear from you immediately.

Yours Sincerely,
Mr Ali Usman.
*

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