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One day I got a surprising message from the UK National Lottery. The message told me that I had won 500,000 pounds sterling. (Which was about 1 million Canadian dollars!) I had a feeling it was fake but I wasn’t sure. Even though it sounded too good to be true, the message still seemed real. There were real sponsors, such as Microsoft, IBM and other well-known companies mentioned in the message. I thought, “Since those companies sell computers, they must get lots of money.” The sponsors are where they get their money for the prize.

I didn’t sign up for any lottery or anything related. But somehow they got my e-mail address and used it to send the lottery message. Since I sign up for lots of websites with my e-mail address, I wouldn’t be surprised if they have it.

They said this lottery takes place every year and it encourages the use of the Internet and Computers. It sounded pretty real to me. I had to contact the “claims agent” to claim my prize and send him my personal information. I did exactly as told. I gave them my address, telephone number, age, country and more. That was a mistake.

After that I looked up the lottery with the draw number and found out it was fake, a scam, and a fraud. I pasted the exact message in a scanning device on a website.

I found out a lot of things. First, the writer “Brian Hunt” has created other known e-mail scams. Two, real lotteries don’t contact people using free e-mail accounts such as Yahoo! and Hotmail. The message I received was from a Yahoo account. Three, you can only win a lottery if you have purchased a ticket. Four, in a real lottery you do not contact “Claims Agents” or “Fiduciary Agents” Just to let you know the UK National Lottery is real but the scammers are just using the name.

On the Internet I found the exact message with the exact serial, ticket, batch and reference numbers. So they must send the message to a lot of people. This is called the 419 scam.

I found out from their telephone number that they are actually from Nigeria NOT from United Kingdom. That’s so people wont find them. The telephone number you call will take you to a phone in United Kingdom. Then from that number you are automatically redirected to gangsters in Nigeria who pretend to be the person you are calling. I found out on a site that if a phone number starts with +44 70 it is probably from Nigeria not UK.

I read that once someone went to Nigeria to claim their prize and they were beaten and murdered. They e-mailed me saying to send my ticket number and batch number to the courier company. I did it just to see how far the gangster can get. Then they e-mailed me again saying that I have to choose a courier option.

That’s why its fake you don’t use courier companies to get your lottery prize in real lotteries. It turned out I had to pay at least $604 to get the money delivered to my house in 5 days and $1500 to get the money straight into my bank account.

All they wanted was the money. But people wouldn’t care since they won over a million dollars and they only have to pay around $604. So that’s how the gangsters make money.

They also wanted our passport or drivers license to identify us. But I didn’t give it. They steal those things.

So that’s where I stopped playing their little game. I didn’t send them a single cent. I shouldn’t have replied to them in the first place. Now they have our personal information. But I reported them. Just remember don’t fight, argue, or give the gangsters anything.

They are dangerous criminals from Nigeria.Just ignore and report them and everything’s cool.

Below is the exact message I got from the UK National Lottery the first time: (Please note the message has been slightly modified. Grammar, punctuation, capitalization, etc. has been fixed.)

The National Lottery,
P O Box 1010,
L70 1NL Liverpool,
UNITED KINGDOM
(Customer Services)

Batch: 074/05/ZY369
Ref: UK/9420X2/68

WINNING NOTIFICATION:
We happily announce to you the draw (#963) of the UK NATIONAL
LOTTERY, online Sweepstakes International program held on the 4th
February 2007. Your e-mail address attached to ticket number: 56475600545 188 with serial number 5368/02 drew the lucky numbers: 12-18-22-24-32-33(bonus no.), which subsequently won you the lottery in the 2nd category i.e match 5 plus bonus. You have therefore been approved to claim a total sum of £500,000 (five hundred thousand pounds sterling) in cash credited to file
KTU/9023118308/03.

This is from a total cash prize of £1,000,000 shared amongst the first
four (4) lucky winners in this category i.e Match 5 plus bonus. All
participants for the online version were selected randomly from World
Wide Web sites through computer draw system and extracted from over 100,000 unions, associations, and corporate bodies that are listed online. This
promotion takes place periodically.

Please note that your lucky winning number falls within our European
booklet representative office in Europe as indicated in your play
coupon. In view of this, your £500,000 (five hundred thousand pounds sterling) would be released to you by any of our payment offices in Europe. Our European agent will immediately commence the process to facilitate the release of your funds as soon as you contact him.

For security reasons, you are advised to keep your winning information
confidential till your claim is processed and your money remitted to
you in whatever manner you deem fit to claim your prize. This is part of our
precautionary measure to avoid double claiming and unwarranted abuse of
this program. Please be warned.

The UK NATIONAL LOTTERY Awards is proudly sponsored by the Microsoft Corporation, the Intel Group, Toshiba, Dell computers, Mackintosh and a conglomeration of other international IT companies. The UK NATIONAL LOTTERY Internet draw is held once in a year and is so organized to encourage the use of the Internet and computers worldwide. We are proud to say that over 200 Million Pounds are won annually in more than 150 countries worldwide.

To begin the claim processing of your prize you are to contact the claims agent with the form below,

You are required to fill this form to facilitate the processing of your
claims which will lead to the payment of your prize to you as required.
PAYMENT RELEASE ORDER FORM

1.FULL NAMES:

2.ADDRESS:

3.SEX:

4.AGE:
5.MARITAL STATUS:

6.OCCUPATION:
7.E-MAIL ADDRESS:

8.TELEPHONE NUMBER:

9.BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF COMPANY/INDIVIDUAL

10.AMOUNT WON:

12. COUNTRY

FUDICIARY AGENT: Mr. Ian Hilton (Rev.)

Email: lottopromoagent2007@yahoo.co.uk
Good luck from me and members of staff of the UK NATIONAL LOTTERY.

Yours faithfully,
Brian Hunt.
Online coordinator
UK NATIONAL LOTTERY,
Sweepstakes International Program.
Open 7 days 7am-7pm.

Please protect yourself from this ridiculous scam.