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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: "Williams Brown Esq." (may be fake)
Date: Mon, 3 Jul 2017 23:34:12 +0100
Subject: Re: Confirm

HSBC Bank Plc
8 Canada Square, Canary Wharf,
London E14 5HQ, UK                                                                  
             
>From the office of
Williams Brown Esq.
General Counsel                                                          
                      
 
Attention: Beneficiary,
 
NOTICE OF IMMEDIATE RELEASE OF YOUR OVERDUE PAYMENT/FUND TO YOUR BANK ACCOUNT
My name is Williams Brown Esq, General Counsel, beneficiary and next of kin locator with HSBC Bank London, also a Genealogists and International Probate Researcher it’s my job to seek out beneficiaries of a will of a diseased HSBC Bank customer who died leaving a will and also the next of kin of a person who died without a will in other for them to receive and manage the estate of their relatives In our policy we don't normally communicate with beneficiaries through this way but we have a case that is peculiar as we have a diseased person who died over ten years ago in an auto crash without leaving a will Two years after his death I was assigned to trace his relative because his record in the government showed that he did not have any family here in UK and after years of investigation I have come to accept that there is no relative of his here in the country and the English law on inheritance is that if beneficiary of an estate is not found to claim the Inheritance or his family relative no matter the distan
 
But if this fails then the money should be sent to the government treasury. This is why am reaching out to you because in my search for his next of kin/beneficiary of his estate your name came as a possible beneficiary because he shares the same last name with you and also had a distant family linage from your country, because I have worked on this for so many years and spent many man hours I will not want it to end in failure where the fund will be sent to the government treasury.
        
So I want to give you a chance to come forward and claim the fund and I will have a report submitted stating that you are a distant family relative and therefor a beneficiary of the fund, all the information as discovered by me during the investigation to enable a successful completion of the claim and the transfer of the fund.
 
So if you are willing and interested to claim this estate / fund as there is no risk and the claim can be completed within 7 working days, you can send your response through the email below and I will commence further communication with you and all the information and documents will be forwarded to you.
Yours Truly                                                                       
 
Williams Brown Esq.

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