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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: (sent from abused email account)
Date: Mon, 17 Nov 2008 16:53:45 -0000
Subject: ****SPAM(13.4)**** PAYMENT NOTIFICATION:PLEASE RESPOND.


Spam detection software, running on the system "www.telnorm.com.mx", has
identified this incoming email as possible spam. The original message
has been attached to this so you can view it (if it isn't spam) or label
similar future email. If you have any questions, see
postmaster for details.

Content preview: Dr Shamsudeen Usman The Honorable Minister of Finance, =
Federal
Republic of Nigeria WWW.FMF.GOV.NG Hello, Be informed that the report =
on
your payment file this morning stated that so many people were interest=
ed
on your payment and that was what brought about the confusion and all t=
he
attempts to divert your fund. Now, every thing regarding the tenure of =
our
corrupt ex President Olusegun obasanjo have been cancelled . [...]=20

Content analysis details: (13.4 points, 5.0 required)

pts rule name description
---- ---------------------- ---------------------------------------------=
-----
3.5 BAYES_99 BODY: Bayesian spam probability is 99 to 100%
[score: 1.0000]
1.9 SUBJ_ALL_CAPS Subject is all capitals
1.5 URG_BIZ BODY: Contains urgent matter
2.2 XMAILER_MIMEOLE_OL_1ECD5 XMAILER_MIMEOLE_OL_1ECD5
0.1 RDNS_DYNAMIC Delivered to trusted network by host with
dynamic-looking rDNS
1.3 MSOE_MID_WRONG_CASE MSOE_MID_WRONG_CASE
3.0 FORGED_MUA_OUTLOOK Forged mail pretending to be from MS Outlook
-0.1 AWL AWL: From: address is in the auto white-list



Anti-fraud resources: