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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: very important and ungent <azonningbogeofroy@gmail.com>
Reply-To: osmanjohn888@gmail.com
Date: Sun, 11 Sep 2022 06:18:52 -0700
Subject: Greetings

Greetings dear, how are you doing today? I hope that you will not expose or
betray this trust that I am about to impose on you. I decided to contact
you on this site to help me actualize this business for our benefit. My
name is Osman Ail, the Auditing and Accounting section manager in the Bank
section here in my bank, there is one of our customers who have made a
fixed deposit of sum of ($6.2)million for 7 years and upon maturity; I sent
the notification to his address, but no response. After a few months, we
sent a reminder and finally we discovered from his business partner that he
died after a brief illness in his country. We tried everything humanly
possible to locate his relatives or family, but all efforts failed. The
deposit is still intact with my bank and the interest is being paid into
the principal sum at the end of each year.

The bank agrees recently that if the fund remains in the account for more
months, it will be confiscated and transferred into the Government treasury
as unclaimed funds based on the law. Hence my contact with you to join
hands with honesty and truth to ensure that the fund is transferred into
your bank account and a bank account anywhere in the world can help the
transfer. All that will be required of you is to contact my bank with the
information I will send you as the next of kin or a business associate of
the depositor and the fund will be paid into a bank account you will
provide. To be honest with you, this is totally legal and 100% risk free.

But the secret must remain between you and me, I have worked with this bank
for many years and I know all the secrets and I have carefully mapped out
my perfect strategies to handle this operation successfully. The depositor
was my close friend before his death. That is the main reason why I know
much about the existence of this fund and the depositor. We will also use
some part of the funds to help the orphanage and less privileged children
in the world.

Please keep this proposal as a secret between us and delete it immediately
in your mailbox if you are not interested.
But if you are interested, give me an answer immediately.

If this proposal is acceptable to you, kindly email your following
information to me:

a. Full Name(s)
b. Direct phone & fax number(s)
c. Your direct email & any other information you may deem helpful.

Thank you and God bless you and your family.

Regards,
Osman

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