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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.
- This email message is a 419 scam. Please see our 419 FAQ for more details on such scams.
Fraud email example:
From: "D C Johnston" (may be fake)
Reply-To: <d.c.johnston@sikhombowealth.co>
Date: Thu, 4 Apr 2019 07:31:02 -0700
Subject: Personal
Good day. I am D C Johnston, a broker working with Sikhombo Wealth Services. We are a wealth management company based in South Africa. I am contacting you because one of my high profile clients is interested in investing in your country and has asked me to look for individuals and companies with interesting business ideas and companies that he can invest in. He wants to expand his portfolio and has interest in investing a substantial amount of revenue abroad. I got your contact when searching the internet through the directory enquiries and I believe that my client will be interested in working with you.
As you can imagine, we have not had any prior communication before so I will be keeping the details to a minimum until I get a confirmation from you that you are interested in this proposal. I will then give you more details upon receiving your positive response. Please provide your direct telephone number as well so that I can give you a call to discuss further.
Best regards,
D C Johnston
Sikhombo Wealth Services
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Anti-fraud resources: