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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: matthew Candle <williamoscar226@gmail.com>
Reply-To: mattcandle@yahoo.com
Date: Fri, 21 Aug 2015 01:32:18 -0700
Subject: REPLY

>From Mr Matthew Candle

I beg your excuse for the inconveniences this mail may cause to you. I
am Mr. Matthew Candle a Banker and accountant with our bank here in
Abidjan. I am the personal accounts manager to one of our clients, a
National of your country, who owned a construction company here in
Ivory Coast (Cote D'Ivoire).

My client, his wife, and their three children were involved in the ill
fated Kenya Airways crash in the coasts of Abidjan in January 2006 in
which all passengers on board died. Since then I have made several
inquiries to your embassy to locate any of my clients extended
relatives but has been unsuccessful.

After several unsuccessful attempts, I decided to trace his relation
over the Internet, but still unsuccessful, so I decided to contact
you. My particular interest is this huge deposit with our bank here
where the deceased has an account valued at about ($16.5, million US
dollars). They have issued me a notice to provide the next of kin or
the bank will declare the account unserviceable and thereby send the
funds to the bank treasury.

Since I have been unsuccessful in locating the relatives for some
years now, I will seek your consent to present you as the next of kin
of the deceased, so that the proceeds of this account valued at
($16.5,million US dollars) can be paid to you and then you and I can
share the money 50 / 50

All I require is your honest cooperation to enable us see this deal
through. I guarantee that this will be executed under all legitimate
arrangement that will protect you from any breach of the law. In your
reply mail, I want you to give me your full names, address, date of
birth, telephone and fax numbers If you can handle this with me.

Thanking you for your anticipated cooperation.

Best Regards
Mr. Matthew Candle.

Anti-fraud resources: