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419 Scams
419 Scams are also known as Advance fee Scams or Advance Fee Fraud. The most popular variant of such scams are the Inheritance Scam and Lottery Scam. The Inheritance Scam is covered in this category, while Lottery Scam is covered in a category on its own.
In general, the scammer in a 419 scam makes up a story about a large sum of money (fake) that does not exist in reality.
In the case of Inheritance Scam (which is what this category will cover), someone rich has died leaving behind a huge sum of money. The scammer will request to transfer the money out of their country with your help, e.g. coming forward to pretend to be the next of kin.
In the process, they will request money from you first to cover some legal fees, bank fees, transfer fees, or whatever they can think of. This fee is called the "Advance Fee" and hence the scam was known as Advance Fee Scam. After you have paid the fees, you can forget about seeing that large sum of fake cash.
The scammers will disappear with your money, and may even use your personal information for identity theft. This is commonly known as "Nigerian Advance Fee Fraud (419)".
Some tips about 419 scams:
1) The sender's email address can be fake. The scammer can send the mails out using any email address via an anonymous mail server.
2) The names used in the email are fake - most of the time. There is no need to inform the police about the names, because they need more than that to find the real person behind all these.
3) The whole story is fake, including the money, dead people (if any), etc.
4) If you still insist on going ahead to try it out, please bewarned "Never Pay Money to Get Money (prize)". We assure you that at some point in the communication process, they will ask you for money. In some cases, they will also ask you for personal identity information, which can be used to scam the bank to provide them with you bank account details.
5) If you received a check from a stranger for any funny reasons, it might be a fake check. When you bank in a fake check, the bank will clear the check and deposit the cash into your account within 3 days. After that, the scammer will ask you to send the money to them. When the bank finds out that the check is fake after about 10 days, they will ask you to return the money.
Best Defense:
1) Do not respond to such emails (delete them!)
2) If you sent any sensitive personal information (e.g. Bank Acct. No., National ID Card no., Birthday, etc) to the scammers, contact the bank immediately so that they are aware of the fraud. If this is a credit card, contact your bank to terminate the card and issue a new one.
3) Inform your friends and family members, esp. the elderly, about such scams. It is too late to tell them if they have already been scammed. Prevention is better because there is no cure!
NOTE: From 12 May 09 onwards, we will be treating this section as a database collection without writing our comments about the "storyline", sender names, etc. We will not be repeating the warnings in each post so as to cut down publishing time. Please keep your post coming in.
419 Scam: Dual ATM Mastercard?
- Article
- March 16, 2010
- No comments
The way the email content is planned is to exploit people who are greedy or need cash urgently.
What is more attractive than someone saying "Hey, I have an ATM or Credit Card filled with free credits or money for you".
There is no free lunch.
419 Scam: Fake Hugh Jones and Associate
- Article
- March 11, 2010
- No comments
419 Scam: Fake Mr Huang from Bank of Overseas
- Article
- March 9, 2010
- No comments
419 Scam: GOODNEWS YOUR PAYMENT VIA ATM CARD IS GAZETTED
- Article
- March 2, 2010
- No comments
419 Scam: UNITED NATIONS OFFICE OF INTERNATIONAL OVERSIGHT SERVICES
- Article
- February 23, 2010
- 1 comment
419 Scam: $35million from Fake HSBC Bank James Mark
- Article
- February 23, 2010
- No comments
419 Scam: ATM INTERNATIONAL CREDIT SETTLEMENT
- Article
- February 17, 2010
- No comments
84 year old scammed and received life-threatening calls
- Article
- February 17, 2010
- 1 comment
419 Scam: Another Iraq-related scam - Fake Sgt Robert Donald
- Article
- February 17, 2010
- No comments
419 Scam: Fake Standard Chartered Bank of Ghana
- Article
- February 16, 2010
- No comments
Fake Name: Joy Mensah
Offer Type: Money Transfer
Transfer Amount: $5.5 million only
Storyline: Just another fund transfer scam.
Location: Claims to be Ghana
Scammer Email: joy2008@saix.net
419 Scam: Fake Mamoud Salif Offers $22.5m
- Article
- February 16, 2010
- No comments
Fake Name: Mamoud Salif
Offer Type: Money Transfer
Transfer Amount: $22.5 million only
Storyline: A rich agricultural equipment supplier died in an aircrash. The scammer is asking you to act as the Next-of-Kin and receive the funds.
Location: Claims to be South Africa
Scammer Email: mr.mahmoud_salif@sify.com
1) This offer is a scam.
2) It is illegal to "impersonate" the next of kin.
One of our readers lost $1,668 USD in fake Ecowas Donation Grant Scam
- Article
- February 15, 2010
- No comments
Some people are still blinded by their greed, and always hold on to their hope that "this wonderful deal is going to be real." There is no free lunch, and if you are inexperienced (i.e. e.g., not a 419 scam baiter), never reply and "see how it goes".These scammers will try to talk you into believing that its "real", and if you don't believe it, then cancel it - all sorta rubbish when the whole story is FAKE.
419 Scam: Bank UBS AG Zurich $232million *Cough* Wow!
- Article
- February 15, 2010
- 1 comment
A scammer impersonating as a consultant working with the Swiss Bank claims that he has found $232million during one of his audit.
So he wrote,"Sometimes a person will open a bank account, deposit money, and then disappear into the tin (thin) air. Banks are not always able to find out what has become of these silent customers, or to know whether they should follow up on requests from people who claim to be heirs to the accounts..."
He is asking for "someone" to help transfer out the money "illegally". This mail is full of lies and he is not who he claims to be.
Assuming that this is real, whatever he asked you to do is illegal. So when you lose money in this scam, it is hard for you to report to the authorities/police for "being scammed while trying to help someone do something illegal."
Its like telling the police "SIR, I was trying to impersonate a Next-of-Kin/Son of some dead rich men to STEAL $232million from the bank, and I lost $25,000 of fake legal fees to this another impostor claiming to be from the bank itself....". Ouch!
Oh!? A scammer complaining about another scammer? Its tough. Don't bite the bait and become another scammer.
Fake Story: US Army Attache Found Money at Haifa
- Article
- February 12, 2010
- No comments
419 Scam: BANK OF AMERICA ONLINE ACCOUNT SETUP INSTRUCTION
- Article
- February 11, 2010
- 1 comment
This whole scam boils down to this statement:
| You have to send the sum of US$999.00 to activate your Bank of America Personal Residential Online Account, this payment will be credited to your Online account before we can fully remitted the amount value of US$10,700,000. |
This is absolutely rubbish. Sometimes you just wish scammers go to hell a million times. Move on unless you have interest in reading the full attachment. If you want to hear about stories about who and what gang is doing this and that, go and try other anti-scam sites. We are not interested if they missed their breakfast this morning, all we know is scammers like this are going to hell whichever group they belong to.
And what are the reasons for this "$10.7million?
| If you try to recollect, you would remember having conducted some businesses in either of the mentioned three tier regions (Africa, Asia and Eastern Europe) and the purpose of selection was randomly made by the United Nation Organization. Our bank stands out from all the presently distressed banks in United State and Northern America to enable the payment of your overdue transaction that has been pending for the past several years released. |
Bags of balls. I can only remember that I dream of throwing a 419 scammer out of my window from my office at the 66th floor.
419 Scam: Its InterPol and not InterNpol - you crashed my spell checker!
- Article
- February 10, 2010
- No comments
419 Scam: Mr.Tomo Sand Nori
- Article
- February 10, 2010
- 1 comment
419 Scam: Paul William and his 1.5million crap
- Article
- February 9, 2010
- No comments
419 Scam: Another 419 Franchisee in China - fake Lee Yang
- Article
- February 9, 2010
- 6 comments
419 Scam: Fake Bank of America email - Updated
- Article
- February 9, 2010
- 1 comment
419 Scam: Someone is Impersonating You and Claiming Your Wealth
- Article
- February 9, 2010
- No comments
Lottery Scam: Fake Diamond Bank and International Monetary Fund
- Article
- February 9, 2010
- No comments
419 Scam: Another Fake FBI scam mail
- Article
- February 8, 2010
- No comments
419 Scam: Fake DR. IGNATIUS IMALA offers $10.5 million
- Article
- February 8, 2010
- 1 comment
419 Scam: I am rich and I am in a hospital in Russia...
- Article
- February 7, 2010
- No comments
419 Scam: Musa Akim offers $25Million
- Article
- February 7, 2010
- No comments
419 Scam: Fake Barrister Edward Douglas offers $2.5million RSVP
- Article
- February 7, 2010
- No comments
Nigerian Pop Star Promotes Anti-Scam Campaign on Music Video
- Article
- February 6, 2010
- 1 comment
419 Scam: FROM THE DESK OF MR AHMED ABDULLAH
- Article
- February 5, 2010
- No comments
419 Scam: Sawdu Bello offers $10.5m
- Article
- February 5, 2010
- No comments
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