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joewein.de LLC
fighting spam and scams on the Internet
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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:
- An email address listed inside this email has been used in a known fraud before.
- The following phrases in this message should put you on alert:
- "million dollars" (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)
- This email message is a fake lottery scam. Consider the following facts about real lotteries:
- They don't notify winners by email.
- You can't win without first buying a lottery ticket.
- They don't randomly select email addresses to award prizes to.
- They don't use free email accounts (Yahoo, Hotmail, etc) to communicate with you.
- They don't tell you to call a mobile phone number.
- They don't tell you to keep your winnings secret.
- 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.
- +31611146478 (Netherlands, prepaid mobile phone)
- This email lists free webmail addresses. Use of such addresses is typical for scams. Lotteries, banks and any but the smallest of companies do not normally use such addresses. Criminals use them to anonymously send and receive email at Internet cafes.
- payagency4@netscape.net (email address has been used in a known fraud before)
- yagency4@netscape.net
Fraud email example:
From: (sent from abused email account)
Reply-To: funky-stuff@yahoogroups.com
Date: Tue, 28 Oct 2008 20:34:57 +0000
Subject: [funky-stuff] Urgent Confinemation
Urgent Confinemation
SIR/ MADAM call us
Kindly contact agent e-mail:payagency4@netscape.net , to claim
Your email address has won you {Us$2.000,000,00}Two Million Dollars from th=
e Lucky Day Lottery Nl online draws held 2008,
Remember all winning must be claimed not later
than 15Th of November 2008 Lucky Number:Mb014926344.Contact Mr,Pieter Vaart=
to claim with your official names,country,address,tel/mobile#,Batct Number=
:HL042/212/87BG,
Ticket Number:NL323/555/897FQ,Contact agent e-mail: payagency4@netscape.net
To claim your winning prize.Kindly get back to our agent e-mail address: pa=
yagency4@netscape.net
Mrs,Irena Versloot.Award Lotto Co-ordinator.Our agent telephone Number Mr,P=
ieter:0031-6111-464-78
Anti-fraud resources:
