Counterfeit Merrill
Lynch Checks being sent to "Atlantic Lottery" scam targets in winning
notices
Wednesday, August 2, 2006
FDIC
Alert received today: Merrill Lynch
Trust Company, FSB, Pennington, New Jersey, has contacted the
Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) to report that counterfeit
checks bearing the institution's name are being circulated with an award
claim letter from the Atlantic Lottery Corporation. The lottery address
appears to be in New Brunswick, Canada.... Read the full alert. You can
be certain that if the same counterfeit checks will be used in lottery
scams using other names, and in other counterfeit draft money laundering
schemes.
U.S.
Powerball lottery games
Wednesday,
June 07, 2006
Once again we
are received fake lottery letters that refer to the US Powerball Lottery
web site.
Lottery scammers
truly enjoy using legitimate lottery names because they know that even if
they send readers to the legitimate lottery web site, no one will bother
to read the rules and regulations.
JACKPOTS ARE ONLY ACCUMULATED THROUGH THE SALE OF TICKETS.
YOU CAN ONLY WIN A LOTTERY IF YOU BUY A CURRENT TICKET (within the last 6
months or less depending on the game).
A
LOTTERY TICKET CAN ONLY BE REDEEMED IN THE STATE, PROVINCE, OR COUNTRY IN
WHICH IT WAS SOLD.
This means that if your were on vacation in the UK and bought a lottery
ticket while you were there, you have to personally go back to the UK to
redeem it.
It seems that
lottery scammers are having fun with this version of the Winning Notice.
They are sending out a very official-looking form called a W-915 in very
official-looking envelopes. There may be no such thing as a Form
W-915, but there is a computer error message called a W915. So you
can be sure that if you receive a Form W-915, it is absolutely, 100% an
error!
Winning
Notifications sent by standard post contain counterfeit checks and money
orders. Saturday,
December 31, 2005
More and more
scam victims are calling to tell us that they received a lottery winning
notification by standard post (snail mail), and that the envelope
contained either a counterfeit check or stolen/forged/counterfeit money
orders.
As usual the
lottery fraudsters include a phone number for the victim to contact them.
It is during the initial phone call that some victims are instructed to
deposit the drafts and then send a large portion by Western Union or
MoneyGram to pay for fake fees, taxes, or other excuses. Some
victims state that the wiring instructions are included in the winning
notification letter, while others are asked to confirm receipt of the
draft and notification by email.
U.S. Treasury Checks are
being sent to victims in Nigerian-style counterfeit check schemes.
Thursday Sep. 8, 2005
We have received
word today that a victim drawn into a Nigerian 419 Scam Letter scenario
was sent a U.S. Treasury Check for several thousand dollars.
According to the Secret Service Agent (Bank Fraud Div) with whom I spoke, the
check was most likely washed. Then the victim's name was inserted
and the dollar amount was changed.
If you receive a
U.S. Treasury check that does not come in an official brown U.S. Treasury
envelope, with a non-cellophane window for the name and address of the
recipient listed on the check, DO NOT TOUCH IT. Immediately contact
your nearest Secret Service Field Office. You'll find the list here:
http://www.secretservice.gov/field_offices.shtml
If you are not
in the United States, please DO NOT TOUCH THE CHECK and contact us
immediately:
New phony "lottery.com"
websites now asking targets to register. June 2nd, 2005
An almost-victim
contacted us today about an old scam name, Charter Trust Worldwide
Lottery. What was different about this call is that she
registered at the [now removed] phony lottery web site.
HOWEVER, she was quickly contacted by email and told she was a winner.
They wanted her to send them $1900. by Western Union to the UK for
transfer fees and insurance. Ri-i-ight. She didn't bite.
Good for her! Remember: you never, EVER
have to pay to obtain lottery winnings! If you want to
see the phony bank.com where they told her she could log in and see her
winnings "on deposit" go here before it's shut down:
http://www.chcc-international.com/jsp/summer/list.asp?tfer=%20&acc=11657463
Site has been shut down
Lottery Scam Artists Now Using Network Marketing
Techniques!
I am being told
by recent victims and recipients of lottery scam letters (both snail mail
and email) that the swindlers are asking for recommendations to friends
and family. If you know of anyone who has been recommended,
please contact them immediately and explain the scam or have them read the
Lottery Scam section front page.
Today I received a Lottery Scam Letter that refers to a web
site. The web site is listed twice in the letter. I clicked on
the first link. That link opened my entire email program. The
second link in the letter took me to my sign-in page. This means
that my mailbox was being captured. If I had replied to the letter,
the swindler would have been able to access all of my email, including
every letter in my folders.
UPDATE: As it turns out, a
reply to the letter would not have been necessary.
DV-2006 (or any
year) USA
United States Government Diversity Lottery (Green Card Lottery / Visa Lottery).
This is a very,
very bad scam that preys on those who want to win a US Green Card. The
lottery is real, but swindlers contact people all over the world giving false
promises about entering and winning the US Government's Diversity Lottery. They only want your money.
We have devoted several pages to this scam.
PLEASE GO HERE
COUNTERFEIT CHECKS ARE SENT TO LOTTERY SCAM VICTIMS!
Lottery
Scam Letter recipients who cannot afford to pay for phony fees are sent
counterfeit cashier's checks, corporate checks, personal checks, and money
orders. The victim is told that he or she must send back a portion of the
check by Western Union. Many different excuses and reasons are given for
this action. Another name for this scam is Overpayment Fraud. NONE OF IT IS TRUE. Please read this:
Nigerian Counterfeit Check Fraud
can happen to YOU!
Here's how it happens, how to protect yourself, how to
really verify corporate and Cashier's Checks, and more.
WARNING!: The Counterfeit Check / Overpayment
Fraud is moving into Asia. Please be on the lookout for counterfeit
cashier's checks drawn on Asian banks and used to pay victims for non-existent
lottery winnings. Instructions are also being given to victims to wire
overpayment funds to Asian banks.
Lotteries
never, ever, EVER ship winnings in cash. NO lottery is going to ship
winnings in cash. Ever. It is ILLEGAL to ship large amounts of cash
across borders without declaring such shipment to Customs Agents of the shipping
country in writing, and there'd better be a very good reason for doing it.
Lottery winnings are not a good reason and the shipment would be denied.
Lottery
Scam correspondence has emerged that is using phony Amtrak Courier Service email
addresses. The correspondence states that the victim will receive his
winnings in cash, and that the currency will be shipped using Amtrak Courier
Service. This is a scheme to get the victim to send money for shipping.
NONE OF IT IS TRUE.
Lottery
Scam letters are being sent out to inform victims that they have won the California Lottery. This is not true. You can only claim winnings
of the California Lottery if you purchased a ticket and then check to see if you
have won. The California Lottery does NOT inform winners of anything.
You have to contact them. This is the only official
California Lottery web site:
http://www.calottery.com/
The
California Lottery is not an Internet lottery. You must physically
purchase a ticket at a ticket machine in California. There are NO
California lottery games other than the ones listed on their official site.
Taxes on winnings are due to the IRS and the State of California. TAXES
DUE TO A GOVERNMENT CAN ONLY BE PAID TO THAT GOVERNMENT, never to a 3rd party.
Not ever. Not in any country on the planet. If you pay your taxes to
a 3rd party and the government comes after you for failing to pay your taxes,
you have no way to prove that you did. It's as simple as that.
Please do
not confuse official lottery sites for different states in the US with web sites
that merely report the winnings. These are legal sites run by
individuals who merely keep track of lottery winnings and post them on their own
site to attract viewers.
All
lotteries must be registered and licensed with a gaming commission or regulator.
A lottery
regulator may be a Ministry of Finance, Ministry of Economics, Gaming Board,
State Gaming Commission, or any of a number differently named agencies.
Individual countries have gaming regulators, and sometimes individual states or
provinces within that country have their own gaming regulators.
Whenever
you receive a winning notification, you can always ask for their license number
and licensing agency. Then you can contact the licensing agency
INDEPENDENTLY by searching for the agency on the Internet. You must NEVER
contact any agency number, name, or address listed in the notification letter.
Obviously, if the letter is from a swindler you will be provided with a name and
phone number of another member of the fraud ring. It's the same as asking
the thief you find in your house if he is going to steal anything.
This is
the link to the Gaming Regulators European Forum list of Regulators:
http://www.gref.net/links_reg.html.
Here you will find links to many Gaming Commission web sites. I have
provided these examples so that you will not be fooled if a lottery scam
swindler tries to put together a web site that just looks like a legitimate
gaming commission or regulator site.
Many lottery companies
also belong to lottery associations and lottery organizations. I
have provided a sample of two lottery organization web sites: The World Lottery
Association and the North American Association of State and Provincial
Lotteries. Again, this gives you the chance to compare legitimate lottery
association web sites with any that a lottery scam swindler may put on the
Internet to fool you.
FRAUDULENT BANK SITES, SECURITY HOUSE
SITES, ESCROW SITES, SHIPPING/COURIER SERVICE, and STORAGE SERVICE SITES ARE
BEING USED IN CONJUNCTION WITH LOTTERY SCAMS.
Lottery
scam victims have been contacting me who have been instructed to open an account
in an online bank, or send money to an online security house or escrow company,
or pay fees to an online courier service and storage or storage service.
Remember, lottery companies DO NOT USE AGENTS and have no use whatsoever for any
of these services.
But, if
you are still unsure about the web site a Lottery Notification letter has sent
you to, you can always write to me, and I'll take a look at it for you, or you can go to
419: Game Over
to see a list of fake bank and lottery sites.
In the last few
days we have received a rash of letters from one so-called Sanctus Musafa
in South Africa. From what we can determine, this swindler purchased
a variety pack of Lottery Scam form letters. So far, he has showed
up under the guise of the Fame Lotto South Africa and Fame Electronic
Lottery. Two counterfeit documents have been sent in, both
supposedly from a Bridgestone Finance. The addresses are different
on each counterfeit letter: see mufasa06
and mufasa07.
