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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: "Mrs. Barbara Johnson" (may be fake)
Reply-To: <bjohson55@live.com>
Date: Thu, 6 Sep 2012 03:49:07 -0500
Subject: From Mrs. Johnson

My Dear,

My name is Mrs. Barbara Johnson am 75yrs old of age, I live in USA,I am a medium scale merchant, I have several industrial companies and good shares in various Banks in the world. I spend all my life on investment and corporate business both is Asia, Europe and America and some part of Africa. I lost my husband and two beautiful children in Plane Crash.

I care about people, since when I have an experience of my difficulty to sleep and have good rest. later in the year 2009 February I was sent a letter of medical checkup, as my personal doctor testify that I have a lung cancer, which can easily take off my life soon. I found it uneasy to survive myself, because a lot of my investment cannot be run and managed by me again. I quickly call up a pastor/prophet to give me positive thinking on this solution, as my adviser. He ministered to me to share my properties, wealth, to motherless baby/orphanage homes/people that need money for survivor, business woman and man for their investment and for future rising.

Therefore I am writing this letter to people who are really in need or help to contact me urgently. so that I can make available preparation on that. Especially women of these days, who are divorced by their husband, why they cannot survive from feeding themselves. Please contact me and stop weeping. Probably let me know what you really need the money for, and if you can still help me to distribute money to nearest orphanages homes near your town. Now am so much with God, am now born again. May the lord bless you, as you reach me, please to remind you, and don’t belong to arms or drugs or any act of fraudulent act in the society. I will give more information to you as I await your response immediately.

Best Regards

Mrs. Barbara Johnson

Anti-fraud resources: