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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: Waheed Umar Abdul <waheed.umar.abdul@gmail.com>
Date: Wed, 2 Oct 2013 13:35:18 +0100
Subject: Linda Scheer

How is your family doing Linda Scheer

I am Mr.Waheed.Umar.Abdul, the manager of account and audit department BSIC
BANK Cotonou, Republic of Benin, During auditing in our department we
discovered an abandoned sum of US$6.450M (Six million Four Hundred and
Fifty Thousand United States dollars) belonging to our deceased customer
(name withheld) who died along with his entire family in a car crash.
Because he died alongside with his supposed next of kin, We have been
expecting any of his relative to come forward for the claim of the funds
because we cannot release it unless somebody applies for it as his relative
as indicated in our banking rules and regulation but no one could come up
for that.

Because you have a similer name with our customer, I contact you to apply
for the claim so my colluege here in our bank and I will use our top
position and connection here in our bank to work the transfer of the funds
to you immediately and we will share it 60% for me and my colluege here and
40% for you.

Please if you are interest to assist us to get the funds transfer to your
bank account immediately for the benefit of you and us according to the
above percentage(60% for us and 40% for you), please get back to me
immediately for more details and procedure.

I am waiting for your urgent response.

Best regards,
Mr.Waheed.Umar.Abdul.

Anti-fraud resources: