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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: "Paul Anderson" <paul.anderson02@msn.com>
Reply-To: mr_anderson203@excite.co.uk
Date: Fri, 28 May 2010 13:53:54 +0200 (CEST)
Subject: From Mr. Anderson

Lloyds TSB Group plc
25 Gresham Street
London EC2V 7HN
United Kingdom

Good Day,

I know that this mail will come to you as a surprise, Please accept the
content in good faith. I do not intend to cause any grief to you and your
family. My name is Paul Anderson a credit officer and also an accounting
officer to Mr. Colin Morley who died in the Tube explosion between King's
Cross-and Russell Square in London.

Our late customer was a successful and an accomplished family man, who
made enough fortune before his untimely death. Since then I had made
several Inquiries to locate any of our customers' extended relative but
this exercise has proved unsuccessful. After several unsuccessful
attempts, I decided to trace his relatives through the Internet, to locate
any member of his family, not much progress was recorded. Our late
customer was an influential wealthy businessman, an oil magnet here in
London and he left behind a deposit of Twenty Million Two Hundred Thousand
British Pounds Only (£20.2MillionGBP) in his domiciliary bank account
here in London .

After the death of our late customer, the board of directors of my bank
adopted a resolution and I was mandated to provide his next of kin for the
payment of this money within 28 Working days or forfeit the money to the
bank as an abandoned property. They had planned to invoke the abandoned
property decree of 1996 to confiscate the funds after the expiration of
the period given to me.

I therefore, decided to contact you with these facts before me, I am very
much aware of our customer financial standing. I seek your consent to
present you as the Next of Kin to the Deceased that the proceeds of his
Bank Account valued at £20.2 Million GBP can be paid to you. We shall
both share the funds 40% for me and 55% to you, while 5% should be for
Expenses or your Government may require as Tax.

I shall assemble all the necessary Legal Documents that will be used to
back up our claim. All I require is your honest cooperation to enable us
seeing this deal through. I guarantee that this will be executed under a
legitimate arrangement that will protect you from any breach of law.
Please get in touch with me by email to enable us discuss further. For
privacy and confidentiality reply use my email: mrpaulanderson94@yahoo.pl

I will be expecting to hear from you.

Best Regards,
Paul Anderson

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