Police in Louis Trichardt have warned Internet users not to react to e-mails asking them for assistance in transferring millions in foreign currency or informing them of huge lottery winnings.

Nigerian 419 and Lottery Scam letters are flooding unsuspecting Internet users’ e-mail inboxes. At present, the Nigerian 419 scam is considered the world’s largest scam in terms of monetary loses.

In the Nigerian 419 scam, unsuspecting Internet users receive an e-mail, normally from someone in a foreign country, claiming to have millions in foreign currency available. In the e-mail, the Internet user is asked to assist this person in getting the money out of that country by acting as a middleman in the transfer process. The Internet user is promised millions in commission. Once the victim reacts, they are then gradually pulled in further and fur-ther into a web of deceit, continuously being asked to pay over thousands of their own money to the fraudsters as part of the “transfer” process. Needless to say, the transfer never takes place and the Internet user never sees his or her money again.

As for the lottery scam, Internet users receive an e-mail informing them that they have won millions in a lottery they did not even enter. Normally, the letter will state something like “your e-mail address was randomly selected as a winner”. Persons reacting to these e-mails will then receive another e-mail, asking for the Internet user’s personal details. Normally, by the third letter, the fraudsters will begin to ask the unsuspecting victim to start paying over their own money with regard to taxes, shipping, bank fees or any of a long line of false reasons. Again, by the time the victim realizes something is wrong, it is too late.

While many merely ignore these e-mails, there are those who unfortunately fall prey to these unscrupulous fraudsters. Such was the case with a Louis Trichardt woman who, over the course of the last six months, lost thousands of rands. She has now gone to the police for assistance. The woman reacted to one of these e-mails in October last year. The fraudsters then made contact with her, first asking her to deposit R7 000 the help them “open a foreign account” for her. After that, the woman was asked to deposit R21 000, this time for another reason. The last payment the woman made was R25 000 as the “FBI” apparently picked up on the transaction and the money was needed to clear the transaction. Every time there was a different excuse why the woman had to pay more money and why the transaction could not be concluded. Along the line, the woman finally realized she was being scammed but had already lost R54 000 in the process.