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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: "Patrick Reynolds" (may be fake)
Reply-To: <patreynolds@w.cn>
Date: Thu, 8 Sep 2011 13:23:35 -0400
Subject: Associate Request

Attn:
Confident this letter meets you in good health.
 
I am Patrick Reynolds; an underwriter with BSN Venture Capital Fund Management Co Malaysia; that specializes in private equity and property equity investment.
Have contacted you on the hope of presenting you as my associate to assume the new recipient of a Fixed-Income deposit valued at $40,000,000.00 .
 
You get 20% of the total $40,000,000.00 equity investment as your commission for acting as my TRUSTEE.
 
Will need your legal details; names, address and phone numbers to enable me re-profile your details on the $40million with the institution where the funds is presently domile as the new recipient.
 
Note that time is of the essence since the fixed-income deposit has to be cleared before the ending of this third quarter of the financial fiscal year 2011
 
I will enumerate further upon your response.
 
Patrick Reynolds.
patreynolds@w.cn

Anti-fraud resources: