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"419" Scam – Advance Fee / Fake Lottery Scam
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The so-called "419" scam (aka Advance Fee fraud, "Nigeria scam" or "West African" scam) is a type of fraud named after an article of the Nigerian penal code under which it is prosecuted.
Typically, victims of the scam are promised a lottery win (example) or a large sum of money sitting in a bank account or in a deposit box at a security company. Often the storyline involves a family member of a former member of government of an African country, a ministerial official, an orphan or widow of a rich businessman, etc. Here is an example. Variants of the plot involving the Philippines, Taiwan, China, Hong Kong, Korea, Iraq, Kuwait, UAE, Mauritius, etc. are also known. Some emails include pictures of boxes stuffed with dollar bills, scans of fake passports, bank or government documents and pictures of supposedly the sender.
Though most of these scams use emails sent in English, we also come across emails translated into French, German, Italian or Spanish, as well as English and French letters by postal mail, usually mailed from Spain.
Back in the 1980s (for this is nothing new!) the main vehicle for this scam were fax machines.
The victims are promised a fortune for providing a bank account to transfer the money to. Then - if they fall for the scam - they are made to part with thousands and sometimes hundreds of thousands of dollars in "fees" (taxes, insurance, legal fees, etc) before the "partners" finally disappear without trace. The promised fortune is never paid out, because it doesn't actually exist. Here are some typical examples of advance fee demands.
Sometimes fraudulent cashier's checks are issued to the victims, who are asked to wire funds for various charges after the bank says funds are "available" from the check. Check can bounce even after they have "cleared" and then the person who deposited is fully liable.
Here are some of the fake reasons given to victims why they should send money:
- Legal fees: Many 419 scams involve a fake lawyer (usually a person who calls himself a Barrister or claims to work for a firm whose name includes the word "Chambers"). Beware of anyone using a @lawyer.com, @justice.com etc. free webmail account who gets introduced in such emails.
- Insurance: Any lottery prize that is supposedly insured is fake.
- Shipping: Real parcel services do not charge $800 and more for delivering a letter. Real lotteries don't ask you to contact a parcel service to arrange for shipping of a check or a winnings certificate that you will have to pay for.
- Wire transfer charges: Real banks charge about $40 for an international wire transfer, not several $1000.
- "Drug free certificate", "Anti Money Laundering certificate", "Terrorist Free Certificate": No such certificates exist in the real world. They are 100% sure evidence of a scam.
The people who receive the scam emails and fall for them often are not the only victims of the scam. We have come across a few cases where people who lacked the funds to cover the advance fee demands committed crimes to get money. They misappropriated often huge amounts from their employers, from charitable organizations they worked for or from other acquaintances they defrauded, hoping they would be able to repay them from the promised millions before anybody would notice. In this way one crime begets another.
Spam emails for advance fee fraud differ from "normal" spam in several ways:
What can you do when you receive a 419 scam mail?
How to report 419 spam to us
Please see our FAQ:
FAQ: "How to report 419 spam to us"
Some 419 related links:
fraudwatchers.org - Fighting scams on the internet
FraudAid - First aid for fraud victims
Scam Victims United
Japan Anti-Scam Organization (JASO)
scambaits.com - the scam baits community
"Artists Against 419" - fighting 419 scams
419Eater.com - scam baiting forum
"419" scam sample email archives:
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Urgent Message - scam letters published
http://419mail.blogspot.com/
419baiter.com - large scam letter archive
http://419scams.tblog.com/ - sample spams published
The following is a list of senders and subject lines received over the last couple of months. In some cases there are duplicates because we received more than one copy in our mailboxes.
"419" scam email archives
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