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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: "Mr. Michael Scicluna" <scicluna@videobank.it>
Date: Tue, 11 May 2010 11:25:05 -0700 (PDT)
Subject: From Mr. Michael Scicluna


>From Mr. Michael Scicluna

With warm heart I offer my friendship, and greetings,and I hopeful that this mail will meet you in good time. However strange or surprising this contact might seems to you, I humbly ask that you take due consideration of it's importance and the immense benefit it will be to us (YOU AND I ). If this proposal do not meet your personal or desired business ethics kindly accept my sincere apology, nevertheless, I strongly believe that it will. I am Mr. M A Scicluna, the Chairman Audit Committee, LLoyds Banking Group United Kingdom.

I am contacting you for a legitimate business transaction strictly to you. I discovered a dormant account in our Bank during our last pre-auditing, with a total sum of 15,000,000.00 {Fifteen- Million Pounds Sterling}. From my investigation, it was clear to me that the owner of this dormant account by name John Shumejda is dead. For more details visit: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/1742404.stm Since his death, nobody has operated in this account because the account has NO BENEFICIARY attached to it.

According to British Government, all dormant account will be confiscated by law if it remains dormant without any claim. I therefore solicit for your sincere cooperation in receiving this fund in your account as the foreign beneficiary of the fund, to avoid confiscating of the fund by the British Government. For details on that visit: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/4017381.stm. If you are interested, kindly get back to me as soon as possible so I can advise you on the information needed from you which, the Attorney who is going to work with me here will use to start the paper work in your name that will legalize and authorize you the beneficiary to the fund to enable the Bank release the fund to your account.This transaction will be done in a legitimate procedure within 10 banking days. Sharing will be 60% for me and 40% for you. Be informed that this transaction is 100% total risk free on both sides. If you have any question kindly state them in
your reply to my email and I will respond to that. Also, include your private mobile number for easy communication.

Warmest regards,
Mr. M A Scicluna
Chairman Audit Committee
LLoyds Banking Group
United Kingdom.

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