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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.

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Some comments by the Scam-O-Matic about the following email:

Fraud email example:

From: "Laurent Mello" (may be fake)
Reply-To: <laurentmello2020@gmail.com>
Date: Fri, 20 Jan 2017 20:32:10 -0800
Subject: Hello My Friend,

Hello My Dear Friend,

My name is Laurent Mello Cote d’Ivoire nationality and I am working as an accountant general and head of the Auditing Dept with the Bridge Bank Cote d`Ivoire and I will be forwarding you a scan copy of my international passports and my working Identification for your view.

I will be here inside the bank to back you up as the original next of kin to our late depositor Eng. Miller Carlos Hector National of your Brazil, who used to work with an oil servicing company here in 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 2009 in which all passengers on board died and since then I have made several inquiries to your embassy in order to locate any of his clients extended relatives but all of my efforts as regards to that has been unsuccessful after several unsuccessful attempts.

I decided to trace his last name over the internet just to see if I could locate any member of his family member before I contacted you for the particular interest in this huge deposit fund with our bank here in Cote d’Ivoire where the deceased has an account valued at about (millions of US dollars)

They have issued me a notice to provide the next of kin or the bank will declare the account un-serviceable and thereby send the funds to the bank treasury account.

Since I have been unsuccessful in locating his relatives for over last 4 years now, I will seek your consent to present you as the next of kin to our deceased client to enable us proceeds with the transfer of the fund to your bank account valued at (millions of US dollars)

After the transfer is been completed, we can share the fund and all I required from you is your honest cooperation to enable us seeing this deal through.

I am guaranteeing you that this transaction will be executed under all legitimate arrangement that will protect you from any breach of the law.

In your mail reply, I want you to give me your full names and your resident address/date of birth, including your private telephone and fax numbers for proper communications.

In order to hasten up every necessary arrangement, contact me immediately on my private email address:laurentmello2020@gmail.com

Thank you for your anticipated cooperation.

Laurent Mello

Anti-fraud resources: