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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: Zul Azim <zulazim2015@gmail.com>
Date: Sun, 5 Jan 2014 12:21:07 -0800
Subject: happy new year

>From zul Azim

REQUEST FOR AN URGENT CONFIDENTIAL BUSINESS RELATIONSHIP

After due deliberation with my colleagues, I have decided to forward to you
this business proposal.
We want a reliable person who could assist us to Receive the sum of Five
Million Five Hundred
Thousand United States Dollars ( $5,500,000 ) into his account.

This fund resulted from an over-invoiced bill from contracts awarded by us
under the budget allocation
to my Ministry and this bill has been approved for payment by the concerned
Ministries.
The contract has since been executed, commissioned and the contractor was
paid the actual
cost of the contract. We are left with the balance US$5.5M as part of the
over-invoiced amount
which we have deliberately over estimated for the investment overseas. But
under our protocol division,
civil servants are not authorized to operate or own foreign accounts. This
is why I am contacting you
to be our custodian for this fund.

As you may want to know and to make you less curious . I am the Chief
Accountant/Internal
Auditor of the Contract Award Committee (CAC ) of the PETRONAS MALAYSIA (
PM).
This transaction is very much free from all sorts of RISKS and TROUBLE from
my Government.
We the PETRONAS MALAYSIA Officials involved in this deal have put in many
years in service to
this Ministry. We have been exercising patience for this opportunity for so
long and to most of us this is a
life time opportunity we cannot afford to lose. You need not to worry about
the responsibilities of
transferring this fund into your account, for all the administrative steps
needed for the transfer
of this fund into your designated bank account will be done by me. I and my
colleagues have agreed to
COMPENSATE you duly if agreement is reached by both of us.
I and one of my colleagues involved in this deal will come to your country
to arrange for our share and
investment meeting,upon the confirmation from you that the money has been
credited into your nominated bank
account.

NOTE: In the event of your inability to handle this transaction please
inform us so that
we can look for another reliable person who can assist in this respect.
It might surprise you why we choose you and trusted you for this
transaction.
Yes, we believe that good friends can be discovered and business like this
can not be realized without trust.
This is why we have decided to trust you for this transaction. We are
looking forward to doing this
transaction with you. Be further informed that everyone's interest and
security had been considered before
you were contacted, so be rest assured and feel free to go into this
transaction with us.
But let Honesty and Trust be our watchword throughout this transaction and
your prompt reply will be highly
appreciated.
Thank you,
Best Regards,
zul Azim

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