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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: mark james <mj84571@gmail.com>
Date: Thu, 14 Aug 2014 11:24:50 +0000
Subject: I NEED YOUR ASSISTANCE INTO THIS TRANSACTION

FROM: MR .MARK ,JAMES.
London, UK.

please reply me on this , Email :{markjames996@rediff.com).

Greetings to You,

Thank you for giving me your time. Please be patient and read my
email. I am a staff of Nat West Bank London Ltd, UK, attached to the
private Banking Services.

I am contacting you concerning a customer and an investment placed
under our bank's management about 5 years ago. In 2009, the subject
matter; Ref: Jp/mch/bank/107 came to our bank to engage in Private
Banking services, I was the officer assigned to his Account. We met on
several occasions prior to any investments being placed. I encouraged
him to consider various growth funds with prime ratings.

Based on my advice, we spun the money around various opportunities and
made attractive margins for our first months of operation, the accrued
profit and interest stood at this point at over 1.2 million United
States Dollars, this margin was not the full potential of the fund but
he desired low risk guaranteed returns on investments. In compliance
to the instructions to liquidate the funds after 4 years in order for
him to make some Investment requiring cash payments in Europe and
America, I made numerous attempt to contact him after 3 years in order
to get further instructions from him. My effort to locate him was
futile, so I immediately passed the task of locating him to the
internal investigations department of our bank.

A person who matched his description was declared dead of heart attack
in Cannes, South France. We were able to identify the body and cause
of death was confirmed.
The bank immediately launched a search to locate possible surviving
next of kin to alert them about the situation and also to come forward
to claim his estate.

There is US$5,000,000.00 deposited, I am privy to the deposit details
and this will be released to no one unless I instruct my Bank to do
so. I decided to trace his relatives over the Internet to locate any
member of his family but to no avail hence I contacted you. I seek
your consent to present you as the next of kin to the deceased as he
no next of kin.
This is to enable us salvage the proceeds of his account and get it
paid to you instead. I have this obsession that if the directors of my
bank confiscate the money and enrich their pockets, it might not be
put into proper and useful ventures to benefit the poor masses of this
world. I am prepared to place you in a position to instruct my Bank to
release the deposit to you as the closest surviving relation. Upon
receipt of this mail, If you give me positive signals, I will initiate
this process and guide you towards a successful conclusion.

I await your quick response.

please reply me on this, Email :{markjames996@rediff.com).


(FILL THIS FORM BELLOW PLEASE AND RESEND IT TO ME).


Your name in full.......................... ........
Your country....................... ..................
Your age........................... ....................
Your cell phone......................... ...........
Your occupation.................... ...............
Your sex........................... ....................
Your International passport..................
Your marital status........................ ........
Your bank name.......................... ..........


Yours Faithfully,
MR MARK ,JAMES.

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