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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: "Mr. Oosthuizen" (may be fake)
Reply-To: <mr.sthomas1234@yahoo.com.hk>
Date: Thu, 12 Mar 2015 23:10:22 -0700
Subject: Re: Letter of Intent

 
Attention:
 
I am  Mr. Oosthuizen of I M F Head Office.
 
Your email appeared among the beneficiaries, who will receive a
part-payment of your contractual sum of  8. 5 Million US Dollars and
has been approved already for months. You are requested to get back to
me for more direction and instruction on how to receive your
fund. However, we received an email from one Mrs. Virgie Brown who
told us that she is your next of kin and that you died in a car
accident last week. She has also submitted her account for us to
transfer the fund to her. We want to hear from you before we can make
the transfer to confirm if you are dead or not.
 
Please in confirmation that you are still alive, you are advised to
reconfirm the below  listed information to enable us facilitate an
immediate payment for you.
 
1 Your f ull names
2 Your present contact a ddress.
3 Your t elephone & Fax numbers.
4 Your O ccupations/age/sex.
5 Your Private E mail Address.
 
Once again, I apologize to you on behalf of I M F (International
Monetary Funds) for failure to pay your funds in time, which according
to records in the system had been long overdue.
 
Thanks,
Mr.  Oosthuizen.

Anti-fraud resources: