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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: "Capt.David Figueroa" <d.leedesign@btinternet.com>
Reply-To: <capt.david_figueroa1@hotmail.com>
Date: Thu, 1 Aug 2002 22:34:32 -0700
Subject: Capt.David Figueroa

Dear Friend,


REQUEST FOR ASSISTANCE

My name is Capt.David Figueroa, I am a captain with the United Nations troop in Afghanistan, on war against terrorism.Our mission is to help beef up terrorist targeted states, mostly the United states and the European Union on the war against terrorism.On the other hand I want to inform you that I have in my possession the sum of 16.2 million USD. This was recovered from one of our raids on terrorists here in Afghanistan because they keep most of their money at home for evil activities which they normally get through illegal deals..

Based on the suffering we undergo here some of us do meet such luck. It happened that I went for this raid with the men in my unit and I decided to take it as my share for my stress here in this evil land filled with suicide bombers. I deposited this money with a Red Cross agent informing him that we are making contact for the real owner of the money. It is under my power to approve whoever comes forth for this money.If you accept, I will transfer the money to you, where you will be the beneficiary because I am a uniformed person and I cannot be parading such an amount so I need to present someone as the beneficiary. I am an American and an intelligence officer for so I have a 100% authentic means of transferring the money through diplomatic courier service .I just need your acceptance and all is done.

Please if you are interested in this transaction I will give to you the complete details you need for us to carry out this transaction successfully. I decided to find someone that is real and not imaginary and that is why I went to a secured site where I can be sure that the
person is real. I believe I can trust you, where we are now we can only communicate through our military communication facilities which are secured so nobody can monitor our emails, and then I can explain in details to you.I will only reach you through email, because our calls might be monitored, I just have to be sure whom I am dealing with.If you are interested please send me your personal mobile number so I can call you for further enquiries when I am out of our military network.

I am writing from a fresh email account so if you are not interested do not reply to this email and please delete this message and if no response after 3days I will then search for someone else. I wait for your contact details so we can go on. In less than 14days the money should have gotten to you and I will come over for my own share when my service ends. I will give to you 50% of the sum and 50% is for me while we would take care of any expenses that may come up during the transaction, I hope I am been fair on this deal.

Get back to me with your full information:

YOUR FULL NAME.......................
YOUR FULL ADDRESS....................
YOUR DIRECT TELEPHONE NUMBER.........

Waiting to receive information from you soon.

Regards,
Capt.David Figueroa

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