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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: "Mr. Ron Mills." (may be fake)
Reply-To: < ericmr81@yahoo.cn>
Date: Sat, 14 Apr 2012 23:42:03 +0500
Subject: MASTERCARD HAS APPROVED YOUR ATM CARD FOR DELIVERY (FBI)

Attn: Beneficiary,
I am Mr. Ron Mills, the personal secretary to the FBI Director; Robert S.
Mueller III. Investigations revealed that you have spent a lot on your
personal earned money obtaining transfer documents as requested by
Imposters, costing you a lot of money, yet all efforts to receive your
overdue payment have been to no avail.
With the help of some of the best Internet investigators attached to the
FBI, we have taken out time in screening through this project as stipulated
on our protocol of operation and in addition, we sent special financial
crime investigators from Washington DC to Africa in other to carry out
proper investigations after receiving series of reports similar to yours as
you are not the only person awaiting the legal transfer of funds from
Africa.
Based on the findings of our special financial crime investigators, we
discovered that your impending payment is being delayed by Imposters,
claiming to be Mr. Lamido Sanusi (The New Governor of the Central bank of
Nigeria), Mr. Patrick Aziza, Mr. Frank Nweke, None existing officials of
Oceanic Bank of Nigeria, Zenith Bank, UK winning Lottery, Andy Lear of Hsbc
bank, Coca-Cola winning lottery and Mr Abdoulie Janneh (UNECA) among a list
of others. With the help of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission
(EFCC) and the Local Police Force these Impostors have been arrested and
necessary legal actions will be taken to bring them to book.
In our bid to transparency, I am pleased to inform you that a meeting was
held as regards the best way to affect the compensation exercise for
transparency and most especially to avoid reoccurrence of the delay in
payment. In conclusion, we came to a final resolution as all the Financial
Institutions involved was duly represented. It might interest you to note
that MasterCard International have hence been empowered to assist the
Federal Ministry of Finance and all the financial institutions involved;
such as the Central Bank, Zenith Bank, and Legit lottery organizations to
immediately commence with the compensation of all the beneficiaries awaiting
the successful transfer of their funds.
The first Batch of payment; Four million, five hundred thousand United
States dollars ($850,000.00), Credited to MasterCard Account No. 5148 6547
8940 **** with serial Numbers: 2419*** and Reg. No. MCIMJ: 5148/4172 was
approved to be issued to you as a valid international ATM MasterCard
accepted in more than a million ATM's, over 210 countries around the World,
with a daily withdrawal Limit of Ten thousand United States Dollars.
$10,000.00.
Now your payment will be sent to you by ATM card that will be coming
alongside a custom pin which you will use to withdraw up to $10,000 per day
from any ATM machine that has the Master Card Logo on it. Also with the ATM
card you will be able to transfer your funds to your bank account, because
the ATM card will be registered with Interswitch. The ATM card comes with a
handbook or manual to enlighten on how to use it.Your ATM card would be sent
to you via DHL,because we have signed a contract with DHL which should
expire by September 30th 2012
Reconfirm your delivery information as stated below for the delivery;
FULL NAME (This name would appear on your MasterCard):
DELIVERY ADDRESS:
CELLPHONE NUMBER:
OCCUPATION:
NOTE: Under normal circumstances, all beneficiaries are mandated to travel
over to Africa Regional office with valid identification's to sign the
release documents in person However, the Finance Ministry insists on you
securing a non Appearance Approval Letter so as to Cut-short Traveling
expenses and stress of traveling over to Africa. The non appearance approval
slip attracts a fee of $200.00 only.
Having said all this, we implore you to expedite immediate action in sending
the $180.00 via Western Union Money Transfer. We hope that this is very
clear. All modalities for the delivery have been employed already.
A receipt to this effect will be sent to you upon confirmation of the
$180.00 fee and the Courier Company will be contacting you too with the
Parcel Delivery Information which will include the Package Tracking Numbers
to enable you track the MasterCard online till it gets to your nominated
address.
CONTACT INFO'S FOR NON APPEARANCE APPROVAL LETTER.
NAME:  Dr. Eric Moore
EMAIL:  ericmr81@yahoo.cn
PHONE:  +234-708-436-9074.
We also advise that you stop further communications with these imposters and
forward any correspondence/proposal you receive from them to email address
of (report.dept@w.cn/report.dept@att.net) in other for the FBI to bring
justice to does still at large.
Mr. Ron Mills.
For: Mr. Robert S. Mueller III
FBI DIRECTOR.

Anti-fraud resources: