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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: "Mrs Julie Thompson" (may be fake)
Reply-To: <daniel_donald00@yahoo.co.jp>
Date: Fri, 4 Apr 2014 18:39:34 -0500
Subject: ATM CARD DONATION FOR YOU

Dear Beneficiary,
 
I am Mother Julie Thompson, 87 Years old woman and the wife of Late Sir Ernest Thompson who died in a Plane crash in September 1998 while they were flying from New York to Geneva.
 
After the death of my husband I managed our investments but now I am old and weak and have decided to spend the rest of my life with my family and loved ones whom I never had time for during the course of my busy business life. Before the death of my husband we had plan to use the last days of our lives to donate half of what we have worked for to the less privilege and charity homes but its so unfortunate that my husband is not alive today to witness this with me. I have decided to do this philanthropic work on his faithful behalf. I am happy that i have succeeded in donating almost half of our assets to several charity homes and to some of the less privilege in different countries.
 
Secondly we also agreed to render support to an individual we have never meet before in life due to the fact when we were still young in life we receive an anonymous help from an individual we did not know and which we have not being able to know or meet again till date, the impact/assistance we got from such gesture made us want to do same. I am sorry to inform you that you will never have the chance to know me because I have just concluded the assignment which my husband and I have agreed upon before his sudden death and you happened to be the beneficiary of our last WILL, irrespective of your previous financial status, hence I need you to do me a favor by accepting our offer.
 
When i visited West Africa to sale off our estate and investment on behalf of my late husband, I realized the total sum of $2,500,000 USD which i instructed the bank to credit in an ATM card which will allow you cash withdrawal from any country's ATM Machine. Due to the promise to my late husband to make this donation anonymous, i contacted a Priest by name Fr. Daniel Donald to keep the ATM card until you make contact to collect it.
 
Kindly contact  Rev. Daniel Donald through his ( ddonald2232@yahoo.fr ) and telephone (+22968746673) tell him that you got the note from me. The security code that the priest will use to identify you is (Question : WHERE? Answer: GOLGOTHA ). The payment has been programmed by me with a secret code which is known by only me so it will only allow you daily withdrawal from any ATM Machine in the world.
 
Reconfirm the below information for your card delivery .
 
Your Full Names:
Your Postal / delivery address;
Direct telephone number;
 
I do not want you to thank me or my husband all we expect of you is to invest wisely and do the same good to someone’s life someday as by rendering selfless service is the only way this world would become a better place.
 
Note that I will no longer be reading my emails or surfing the internet as I have retired completely from the outside world to my ranch, at this moment I have nothing to do with cars, emails and other luxuries, all further correspondence should be forwarded to Rev. Daniel Donald ( ddonald2232@yahoo.fr  ) for the delivery of your ATM card to you.
 
Yours Faithfully,
Mrs. Julie Thompson.

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