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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: "Thomas Blackman" (may be fake)
Reply-To: <thomasblackman126@yahoo.com.ph>
Date: Wed, 14 Aug 2013 08:15:53 +0100
Subject: REPLY OR CALL IF YOU ARE INTERESTED IN THIS PROPOSAL

Attention:

I am Mr. Thomas Blackman, the Client Service Manager/Auditor General with a notable Financial home in United Kingdom
In the course of my auditing, I discovered a floating fund in a dormant account belonging to Mr. Mahmood Mustafa Dewani, an Industrialist/Oil Magnate, who made a fixed deposit of $42,500,000.00 for several calendar months; which was opened in 2001 at my branch.
Upon maturity, several notices were sent to him on annual basis for over 6 years ago (2007).Again after the war, another notification was sent and still no response came from him. We later found out that Mr. Mahmood Mustafa Dewani and his family has been killed during the war in bomb blast that hit their home at Mukaradeeb where his personal oil well was located.

My proposal, I am prepared to place you as the next of kin in a position to instruct my bank to release the deposit to you as the closest surviving relation to the deceased customer. Should you be interested, please indicate your interest by sending me a message immediately via email and provide me with the following details as stated below;

YOUR FULL NAME,
YOUR OCCUPATION,
YOUR CONTACT ADDRESS,
YOUR AGE,
YOUR DIRECT TELEPHONE OR MOBILE #.


I completely trust you to keep this proposition absolutely confidential as I look forward to your prompt response.
You can reach me in any of these numbers:+44 7031964449 or +44 7031974668


Sincerely,
Mr. Thomas Blackman

Anti-fraud resources: