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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: Fed Fbi <fedfbimail@rocketmail.com>
Date: Sun, 27 Feb 2011 01:29:06 -0800 (PST)
Subject: United States Department of Justice






United States Department of Justice
Federal Bureau of Investigations
J. Edgar Hoover Building
935 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW
Washington, DC. 20535-0001
 
Date: Feb.27th, 2011
 
It has come to our notice that $10,500,000.00 has been released into Bank of America in your name as the beneficiary. The banks know that it does not have sufficient facilities to effect this payment from the United Kingdom to a temporary account in your name; the bank has used what we know as a secret diplomatic transit payment S.D.T.P to transfer these funds.
 
It is still, waiting for you to confirm the transfer of funds, so that it can credit to your account. Secret diplomatic payments are not made unless the funds are related to terrorist activities why must your payment be made via secret transfer, if your transaction is legitimate. If you are not a terrorist, then why have you not received the money directly into your account; this is a pure veiled means of payment.
 
We advise you to contact us immediately, as the funds will be held in our custody, until you provide us with an Immunity Seal of Transfer (IST) from the local bank that authorize the transfer from where the funds was originally transferred, to declare that the funds that you are about to receive from Nigeria are terrorist/drug free. We shall release the funds immediately we receive this legal document.
 
You are to reassure and prove to us that what you are about to receive is a clean money by sending to us the Immunity seal of transfer (IST) to confirm to us that the money you are about to receive is legitimate. If you fail to provide the Immunity seal of transfer (IST) within three working days, we will take proper action against you for not proving to us the legitimacy of the fund you are about to receive.
 
This condition is valid untill  March 5th, 2011 after we shall take actions on canceling the payment and charging you for moving funds illegally.
 
Signed
Robert Mueller
FBI director
Federal Bureau of Investigation.



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