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.

Wednesday, May 10, 2006

WINNING NOTIFICATION

From: powerballwinners@f2s.com <powerballwinners@f2s.com>
Date: 10-May-2006 03:20
Subject: WINNING NOTIFICATION

Dear Lucky Winner,

POWERBALL LOTTERY IN CONJUNCTION WITH THE EUROPEAN SOFTWARE MANUFACTURERS
ASSOCIATION.

We are pleased to inform you of the result of the just concluded draw of 7th
May 2006, POWERBALL in conjunction with The European Software Manufacturers
Association Annual Promo Draws.
The online European Software Manufacturers Association Annual Promo draws was
conducted by POWERBALL LOTTERY with an exclusive list of 29,031 email addresses
of individual and corporate bodies picked by an advanced automated random
computer search from the internet. However, no tickets were sold but all email
addresses Were assigned to different Batch numbers for representation and
privacy.

After the automated computer ballot, your e-mail address emerged as one of the
winners in the draw of 7th May 2006, with the following data:

REF NUMBER: PWLIN/652311872/06
BATCH NUMBER: 074/06/369MM
WINNING NUMBER: 4/29/2006:151743444829

You as well as other winners are therefore to receive a cash prize of Euros1,
500,000.00 (ONE MILLION, FIVE HUNDRED THOUSAND EUROS ONLY) each from the total
payout, your prize award has been insured with your e-mail address and will be
transferred to you upon meeting the requirements, statutory obligations,
verifications, validations and satisfactory report.To begin your claims, you
are advised to contact our licensed and accredited Claims Manager in Europe
with the information below:

=========================================================================
Mr. Donald Van Oliver,
PROMO CLAIMS MANAGER
Email: powerballlottery@netscape.ca
Tel: +-31-620-244-951.
Fax: +: 31-84-752-0588
=========================================================================

NOTE: All winnings must be claimed not later than 17th May 2006,after this date
all unclaimed funds would be included in the next stake.Remember to quote your
reference information in all correspondence with your claims agent.You are to
keep all your winning information away from the general public especially your
reference and ticket numbers. (This is important as a case of double claims
will not be entertained). Please be warned! Fraudulent emails are circulating
that appear to be using POWERBALL addresses, but are not from POWERBALL LOTTERY.
PLEASE REPORT IMMEDIATELY TO: ANY LAW ENFORCEMENT AGENT NEAREST TO YOU.

Yours Sincerely,
Agatha De Bore (Mrs.).
ESMA Games/Lottery Coordinator
www.powerball.com

No comments: