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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: "Bernard Madoff" (may be fake)
Reply-To: <bernardmadoff64@gmail.com>
Date: Tue, 17 Oct 2017 23:21:49 +0200
Subject: VERY IMPORTANT!!!

Dear Friend,
 
I am Bernard Madoff, the founder of Wall Street Firm, Bernard L. Madoff  Investment Securities LLC in 1960 and was the former chairman of NASDAQ. I was accuses of fraud worth over $170 Billion Dollars and was arrested on Dec 11, 2008 and on March 12, 2009, I was convicted of 11 Federal crimes and admitted to operating the largest ponzi Scheme in history.(http://money.howstuffworks.com/ponzi-scheme5.htm) Let me not go into much details.
 
I have in my possession the sum of One Hundred and Fifty Million Euros (150,000,000.00Euro) in a bank outside U.S.A, which nobody else knows about this except my lawyer who helped me to make the deposit. I need your help, to get this money out from the bank where its deposited and use it for charity purpose.
 
This is the sharing modalities, 70% goes to charity which include promotion of gospel, building of churches and mosques all over the world and 30% for you.
If you are capable to handle this project, on my behalf, then kindly get back to me for more details, via my email address bernardmadoff73@gmail.com
 
I will be waiting for your reply any moment from now.
 
With Kind regards
 
Benard Madoff

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