Lotteries

Lotteries

These scams involve letters or email messages which advises that YOU have won a prize in a lottery!

It's a scam..

  • If you have never entered a lottery and you are told you have won one .
  • If you have to pay anybody any money to obtain your "winnings"
  • If you are sent a cheque do not cash it. It is usually a forged, or stolen cheque, and YOU will have to pay the money back to your bank.
  • If you have "won" a lottery and are then told to fill out a form with personal details. (All they want is your personal information to access your bank account.)

A real company or business will never have your name or email address "automatically entered" into ANY legitimate lottery.

How it works

To obtain the funds, the recipient is asked to respond to the letter or email message. A request will then be made for the recipient to provide his/her bank account details to allow for funds to be transferred.

The recipient may even be asked to pay a handling/processing fee. Just remember, that a legitimate prize seldom comes with strings attached. This fee, if paid, will be lost.

It is also very likely that any details you provide will most probably be used to perpetrate other fraud.

Who does this?

The majority of fake lotteries are run from European cities by unscrupulous persons. They operate in cells with one group doing the mass mailings, another group acting as the "contact group" and the third collecting the money. The perpetrators are highly organized and very good at conning people.

Protecting yourself

The nice thing about the Internet is that you are able to do your own sleuthing to determine whether or not the letter, fax or email is legitimate. Each letter usually contains:

  • Return email addresses
  • Names
  • Locations
  • Phone numbers

A simple "Google" of any one of these indicators will usually lead you to a web site where the same name, email or phone number has appeared before.

What to do if you get one

The simple answer is 'delete it' and get on with your life! Or, if the request came via the mail (aka 'snailmail') , pass it along to your government mail service - we're sure they would be interested in having a look at it!