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joewein.de LLC
fighting spam and scams on the Internet
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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:
- This email uses a separate reply address that is different from the sender address. Spammers use this to get replies even when the original spam sending accounts have been shut down. Also, sometimes the sender addresses are legitimate looking but fake and only the reply address is actually an email account controlled by the scammers.
- The following fake company names, fake addresses, non-existent institutions/documents or other details have appeared in scams before:
- "uk national lottery" (can only win this lottery if you bought a ticket)
- The following phrases in this message should put you on alert:
- "million pounds" (they want you to be blinded by the prospect of quick money, but the only money that ever changes hands in 419 scams is from you to the criminals)
- This email message is a fake lottery scam. Consider the following facts about real lotteries:
- They don't notify winners by email.
- You can't win without first buying a lottery ticket.
- They don't randomly select email addresses to award prizes to.
- They don't use free email accounts (Yahoo, Hotmail, etc) to communicate with you.
- They don't tell you to call a mobile phone number.
- They don't tell you to keep your winnings secret.
- They will never ask a winner to pay any fees to receive a prize!
- This email lists mobile phone numbers. Use of such numbers is typical for scams because they allow criminals to conceal their true location. They can receive calls in an Internet cafe from where they send you emails, while pretending to be in some office.
- +447024072104 (UK, redirects to a mobile phone in another country)
Fraud email example:
From: "The National Lottery" <florasyria.com/webmail@mtelecom.bg>
Reply-To: uknationallotttery@yahoo.co.uk
Date: Wed, 28 Oct 2015 19:12:34 +0200
Subject: Congratulations!!!
The National Lottery.
London,UK.
Ref No: UK/9420×2/10
Batch No:074/03/zy369
Tell:+447024072104
We are happy to announce to you the draw (23-25-28-33-44-49) of the UK
NATIONAL LOTTERY, online sweepstakes International program held October
2015 in London (United Kingdom.Your e-mail address attached to ticket
number:56475600545188 with Serial number 5368/02 drew the lucky numbers:
06-08-13-15-21-40(bonus no:35),which subsequently won you the lottery in
the 2nd category i.e match 5 plus bonus.
You have there fore been approved to claim a total sum of 860,000.00(Eight
Hundred And Sixty Thousand Pounds sterling) in cash, credited to file
ktu/9023118308/15. This is from a total cash prize of 3.4 million pounds,
shared among-st the first four (4) lucky winner in this category.
You are expected to fill and submit back the below details to the
fiduciary immediately via email.
FULL NAMES:
HOME ADDRESS:
TELL:
SEX:
OCCUPATION:
COUNTRY:
ALTERNATIVE EMAIL:
Once again congratulation for your winning award.
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Anti-fraud resources:
