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: "DR VENDA JOHNSON" (may be fake)
Reply-To: <officeimf@mynet.com>
Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2014 20:01:59 -0800
Subject: A Solemn call to Serve Humanity

FROM The Desk Of: DR. VENDA JOHNSON PhD
International Monetary Fund (IMF).
ATTENTION OF: Beneficiary,

Fund Investigation Unit is an international independent fund management outfit recognized by the World Bank
and International Monetary Fund (IMF)to resolve major financial obligations of nations who have subscribed
to its Multilateral Agreement Bond (MAB) and to suggest how best dormant funds could be utilized in each
particular year. In the course of our duty, we have found large sums of unclaimed dividends amounting to
several millions of dollars in various countries of the world. Our effort to locate the investors of these unclaimed
equity and dividends has proved unsuccessful, largely due to the fact that most of the investors had died not
knowing the worth of their investments and not mentioning them to their folks.

We therefore suggested and received the approval of the World Bank to invest these funds in categorized
countries for charity. To achieve this,we sought the assistance of internet marketing firms who advertised
and obtained for us email subscriptions of individuals who would like to benefit from this charity disbursement for
the purpose of setting up charitable organizations.

These email addresses were used for our recent draw which is our 4th draw since the year of our Lord, 2013.You
are being contacted because your email address drew one of the winning umbers marked FIU11400307 for the
allotment of $5.5M. For us to pay you this money, we must be able to certify the following;

1. That you are honest, responsible and dedicated.
2. That you do not have any history of crime.
3. You must be able to spare 2-3 hours daily for charity.

Note that we do not monitor the operations of successful allots in the discharge of their charity works as we have
so many of these organizations in various countries of this world. You must therefore see this as A Solemn call to
Serve Humanity and in particular the less privileged citizens of your country.

Your entitlement sum of $5.5M is payable to you either through A CERTIFIED BANK DRAFT OR BY TELEGRAPHIC
TRANSFER TO YOUR NOMINATED BANK ACCOUNT.

For further inquiries, get back to us through this email.(officeimf@mynet.com)

Accept our magnificient Congratulations for your great success in advance.
Yours Faithfully,
REV DR VENDA JOHNSON PhD
International Monetary Fund (IMF)

Anti-fraud resources: