joewein.net   joewein.de LLC
fighting spam and scams on the Internet
Try our spam filter!
Free trial for 30 days
  jwSpamSpy

Home
About Us
Spam
419/Nigeria
Fraud
Contact

"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: Mirinda Johnson <mirinda.paulj@gmail.com>
Reply-To: Mirinda Johnson <mirinda_johnson@yahoo.ca>
Date: Mon, 17 Nov 2014 22:32:59 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: Hello Dear One


 Hello Dear One

Compliments of the day, I am Miss. Mirinda Johnson, 22 years old lady, a Sociology student from Guinea Bissau university and a daughter of late Mr. Paul Johnson who was the former deputy minister of national security under the leadership of president Kumba Yalla who is now facing judgement at the international court of justice for war crime and abusing human rights. I am constrained to contact you because of the maltreatment i am receiving from my step mother who planned to take away all my fathers treasury and assets from me since the unexpected death of my Father. Meanwhile I had wanted to travel to Europe but she hid my international passport and other valuable travelling documents but fortunately for me she couldn't discover where I kept my fathers file. I am now writing you from Ouagadougou Burkina-Faso where I escaped for my life and now seeking asylum in a private charity organization under St Johns Catholic Church here in Burkina-Faso.

In search for an honest and reliable person to help relocate in any of the western world for a better life and to continue my studies, I have chosen to contact you after getting your email through a database and I believe you are a reliable person who will not betray my trust. I know you may wonder why I am telling you about all this without seeing or knowing you fully but something in me tells me that you are a good person and I hope you don't get me wrong. Briefly, I would like to disclose little more about myself to you and see if you can help me to relocate to your country for a continuous life, studies and equally to have a new life. Please this is a little secret and I plead with you to keep it to yourself alone until everything is properly arranged and executed then I will come over to join you in your country, I have the sum of $5.7million as an inheritance from my late father which I will like to invest in your country with your help and this is
reason why I need your help based on the instruction my late father gave to the bank to release the fund to me at the age maturity and through a foreigner who can help me invest the fund wisely and I can not be able to make this claim because of my refugee status.

This fund is deposited in my late father's bank account with one of the banks here in Burkina-Faso and I am going to give you every details and contact regarding this fund because I want the money to be transferred to your account before I come over to join you in your country. I need your urgent response showing your willingness and capability to handle this successfully for me, life in this refugee camp is very hard and hell to me as i find no love and affection, more especially I love my studies and here nothing is happening and people here are not friendly. I am really suffering in this place except for the rev father who gave me access to his office computer to be checking my email once he is less busy after i had narated my stories to him,I hope with your help to e in transferring the fund in your account will win a fortune in my heart as I will have a better life to live. kindly let me know your willingness and I promise to be nice and faithful to
you. I will send to you a copy of my photo as soon I receive your positive respond, thanks and God bless you as i am looking forward to seeing your reply.

Yours Sincerely
Mirinda Johnson

Anti-fraud resources: