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joewein.de LLC
fighting spam and scams on the Internet
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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:
- The following phrases in this message should put you on alert:
- "huge amount of money" (they want you to be blinded by the prospect of quick money, but the only money that ever changes hands in 419 scams is from you to the criminals)
- "million united states dollars" (they want you to be blinded by the prospect of quick money, but the only money that ever changes hands in 419 scams is from you to the criminals)
- ",000,000" (they want you to be blinded by the prospect of quick money, but the only money that ever changes hands in 419 scams is from you to the criminals)
- This email message is a 419 scam. Please see our 419 FAQ for more details on such scams.
Fraud email example:
From: "Farid Taib" (may be fake)
Date: Sun, 22 May 2011 22:25:41 +0800
Subject: Please reply/call me.
My greetings to you.
I am Mr.Farid Taib, director of a government parastatals in Malaysia. I want us to go into a mutual beneficial business that needs your strict confidentiality and dedication. This business involves the transfer of a huge amount of money from my Country Malaysia. It has very little liabilities and it is very safe and risk free. The fund to be transferred is Eighteen Million United States Dollars (US$18,000,000:00) and it is generated from an over-invoiced surplus contracts. Your job is basically to act as a sub-contractor to my department and get this money out for us. You will get 30% of the totall fund for helping us to accomplish this transaction.
Please, kindly respond to this e-mail with your Full Name & Telephone number if you are interested so that i can provide you with more details to preceed.
I await your anticipated positive response.
Mr. Farid Taib
Tel:+60-104273493
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Anti-fraud resources:
