Lottery scam quick guide: it's a scam if...

  • you win any lottery where you didn't buy a ticket! It's really that easy! It's not just too good to be true: it's bait in a trap!
  • you receive a generous grant out of the blue. Sadly (but not surprisingly) there aren't any benevolent people regularly throwing around millions of pounds/dollars/euros to randomly chosen people. This is just the lottery scam without the ticket.
  • they send you partial payment in the form of a cheque, money order, or direct bank transfer and want you to pay them fees out of that money. They're playing you for a sucker: cheques are frequently forged, and direct transfers made by compromising some poor schmuck's online banking service. You'll wind up a victim of fraud, or a party to it.
  • they want you to send them any money of any sort for any reason. They might try to say there are courier fees or taxes to cover. They're lying. Call their bluff and tell them to take the fees out themselves -- they'll never ever agree, because they can't defraud you unless money is making the reverse trip from you to them somehow.

Friday, November 03, 2006

WINNING NOTICE...CONGRATULATION

From: [redacted as suspected irrelevant third party address]
Date: 04-Nov-2006 00:37
Subject: WINNING NOTICE...CONGRATULATION
To: undisclosed-recipients


GOVERNMENT ACCREDITED LICENSED LOTTERY PROMOTERS.
NOTICE FOR CATEGORY \"A\" WINNER

Dear Lucky Winner,
RE: LOTTO INTERNATIONAL NL PROMOTION PRIZE AWARDS WINNING NOTIFICATION

We are pleased to inform you of the result of the just concluded
annual
final draws of Lotto International Netherlands programs. The online
cyberlotto draws was conducted from an exclusive list of 25,000
e-mail
addresses of individual and corporate bodies picked by an advanced
automated random computer search from the internet. No tickets were
sold.After this automated computer ballot, your e-mail address
emerged
as one of two winners in the category \"A\" with the following:

Ref Number: PC 607 ES 208
Batch Number: 26371545-LNI/2006
Ticket Number: PCP 002 871

You as well as the other winner are therefore to receive a cash prize
of EUR 1,500,000.00.each from the total payout. Your prize award has
been insured with your e-mail address and will be transferred to you
upon meeting our requirements,statutory, verifications,
and satisfactory report.To begin the claims processing of
your prize winnings you are advised to contact our licensed
claims agent for category \"A\"winners with the information below:

Mr.Donald Van Oliver
Department Director,
Netherlands Lottery International
Amsterdam, The Netherlands
E-mail:nlwinners_claims06@walla.com
phone:+31 616 735 356

NOTE:All winnings must be claimed not later than 14 days. After this
date all unclaimed funds would be included in the next stake.

Yours faithfully,
Mrs.Agatha DeBoer,
Lotto International Netherlands

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