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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: Anthony Charles <anthony@contactdepartment.biz>
Date: Sat, 20 Mar 2010 01:31:48 -0700 (PDT)
Subject: REPLY ME


From: Mr. Anthony Shepherd
Occupations: External Auditor
she.pherdanthony@hotmail.com

ATTENTION PLEASE:

Please do accept my sincere apologies if my mail does not meet your personal ethics although, I wish to use this medium to get in touch with you first because it's fastest means. My name is Mr. Anthony Shepherd, I am an external auditor of a well known bank here in the United Kingdom.

In one of our periodic auditing I discovered a dormant account with holding balance of £26,000,000 (Twenty six Million British Pounds Sterling) which has not been operated for the past Six to seven years. From my investigations and confirmations,I confirmed that the owner of this account, a foreigner by name Mr.John Shumejda died in plane crash on the 4th of January 2002 and since then nobody has done anything as regards the claiming this money because he has no family members who are aware of the existence of neither the account nor the funds. For more details
visit: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/1742404.stm

I got your mail from the internet through my secretary when I told her that I need an email address where I will send a confidential message because she knows how to browse internet but she is not aware of this business.

You should know that I am not doing this business because of the large amount that is involved on it but rather the success of this business will benefit both families from generation to generation as far as you follow the instruction which I will be getting from our Insider in Bank, and you should know that never a business to succeed without building trust to each other. I promise you that I will never let you down in this business either now in the future and you assure me that as well. Infact , I am very much interested to know whether you will be capable to do this business with me in full confidence trusting that you will never let me down in future.

I have secretly discussed this matter with a top senior minister official of the federal ministry of finance here and we have agreed to find a reliable foreign partner to deal with us although due to his position, he did not want to take active part but as soon as you follow my instructions everything will be successful because we will be working hand in hand with him and there will be documents of transfer to prove that the money going into
your a/c is free from Drug/terrorist and money laundering, once I received your a/c information for processing of the Documents.

We thus propose to do business with you, standing in as the next of kin of these funds from the deceased and after due legal processes have been followed, the fund will be released to your account without delay and we will use it for investment and to assist the less privileged in the Society because if we left the fund with the government it will be fortified for nothing and will be used to suppress the poor masses in the society.

This transaction is totally free of risk and troubles as the fund is legitimate. Upon the successful transfer of the fund to your account, you will be given 40% of the total amount while 60% will be for me. If you are interested, kindly send me Your account information as states below where you will like the money to be transfered into so that I can send application for the release of the fund in your name immediately. Even an empty account can serve provided it is valid.

Send the below information to enable us to proceed.
1. Your Full Name
2. Your contact address
3. Your age/Occupation
4. Your telephone number.
I look forward to hear from you as soon as possible if you are intrested.
Regards,

Mr. Anthony Shepherd

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