I have pasted several examples of emails to be on the look-out for. These are actual emails sent to me in the span of two days. Note the similarities and by all means, delete or report them:

Example#1

Hello,

Am okay with the price and the condition and i will like to make an outright purchase of this particular item immediately because i noticed that you are serious seller, I anticipate that a cashier or certified check will be sent to you via express mail or ups as the mode of payment,concerning the pick up, i will be responsible for that, where my mover will come for the pick up at your location upon your confirmation of receiving the payment. So i will send the payment which will include the pick up charges in which you will make payable to the mover immediately you receive the payment to aviod the delay.Would really love to come for the viewing but due to my work frame  that might not be Possible..and I will like you to provide the information below so that the payment will be done as soon as possible:-

1...................Full name
2...................Full home address
3...................Zipcode
4...................Tel#.

Awaits your response asap.

Best Regards.

Example #2

Hello,

Do you still have the item for sale and whats the present condition and your final asking price ? let me read from you.

Dave.

(Let me READ from you? -- Give me a break, dude)

Example#3

Hello,

I would like to buy your item which you want to sell on Craigslist Advert. I want to know if its still in good conditions for use ? Also if you can accept US Certified Check  for mode of  payment that is the only way i can have payment mail out to you. The check will be delivered to you via ups mail just fews days after it has been mailed out to you. If you are ready to sell it to me, kindly get back with the informations below so I will use it to make payment out to you immediately i get them from you.

> 1. FULL NAME
> 2. PHYSICAL ADDRESS BECAUSE UPS DON'T DELIVER TO P.O BOX
> 3.ZIP CODE
> 4. YOUR TELEPHONE NUMBER FOR EASY COMMUNICATION.

I want you to know that i am ok with the price of ***. I will come in person as soon as possible to pick it up after when the payment cleared in the bank not going any less for it. I'd be so glad if you can sell it to me as i would really love to buy the item also can i see more of the pics for the item? I will be waiting for your quick response.

Yours Sincerely
Mr Marvin
The Proprietor,
Convenant school.

What happens next is that the so-called interested party sends out a bogus check for many times the asking price then apologetically ask you to send the rest back minus a hundred bucks for your trouble. You then find out that the original 'certified check' sent to you is a fake which makes you responsible for any and all debt to the bank.DON'T FALL VICTIM TO THIS RUSE! Delete the email immediately. We, as consumers need to be aware at all times and remember that if something sounds too good to be true, it probably is.

First of all you need to sign up as an eBay member. You will be required to provide all kinds of personal details and your credit card, or bank details, if you do not have a PayPal account.

Sellers post their goods via a special form, or system of forms provided by eBay. Decide what starting price you want for your item, describe it, add a photo and wait for the bids. This costs money. You have to pay for the listing and a further fee is charged as a percentage of the selling price.

As you go through the posting process you will be asked if you want various extra features like additional photographs, bold headings, etc. These cost extra money too and you may not be aware of this until you see the final charge at the end. You can backtrack if you need to change something.

Postage/Shipping prices are entered as an additional amount and should be reasonable or you will get complaints.

You can start the bidding at a very low amount but be aware that you are committed to sell at the price the auction reaches unless you place a reserve on your item. This, of course, costs extra money.

Buying looks easy and it if you are careful. Always read the details properly. I have recently heard of a person buying perfume and finding that it was just a tiny, sample bottle although the picture was a much larger bottle. The seller had done nothing wrong (technically) because the size had been stated in very small print in the description. This has also happened in the case of a leather office chair that was sold at a few hundred dollars and turned out to be a toy one. That seller had technically committed no offense.

Check out the feedback on the sellers account but be aware that this can be false. The seller may have found a way to add feedback to their profile.

If you are spending a large amount of money try to contact other people who have bought form the seller and get their feedback directly.

There has been trouble on eBay with fake goods of all varieties and it seems that as fast as these listing are removed, more are added. The general rule is that the price seems too good to be true, it probably is.

There is also a practice called shilling that is quite prevalent on eBay. This is where there are no, or few bids, on an item and the seller, or their friends bid to artificially inflate the price when they have no intention of buying. Don't get carried away and bid more than you intended. It is quite easy to keep increasing you bid little by little, just for the thrill of winning and to find out that you are paying too much in the end.

One important thing on eBay and other on line sites is to protect your personal details. It is wise to have a PayPal account which protects you r personal information and affords some protection if you do fall prey to someone who is less than honest.

Don't let this put you off eBay. If it is used with caution it can be fun buying and selling things. After all, one man's junk is another man's treasure.

Here are some examples of their mode of operation (Modus Operandi) for scamming people.

1. Fake Check

This is the check that I have received:

Thoughts after receiving the check:

• Is there any HSBC Bank plc?
• I am selling phones priced from $100-$800 but the buyer sent me a 20,000 British pound check.
• The buyer keeps on calling me and rushing me into shipping out the phones he ordered after I receive the check and demanded it within in the next 24 hours.
• The buyer has a British accent but wants me to ship his orders to Nigeria.

Definitely a SCAM!

2. Solicitation Letters

I posted a comment at a forum which is about phone reviews and stuff. The next day, I was surprised to receive an e-mail from someone in Africa.

Thoughts After Receiving The Email:

• Ok, I do pity those who are less privileged but the sender asked me to give her a used phone and even mentioned what model she wanted.
• Gambia, West Africa?
• She's from Africa but her yahoo mail is registered at co.uk?

Another SCAM!

3. They Have Millions In The Bank Of Africa But They Need Someone To Get It For Them

I think many people are receiving this kind of email. Supposedly one of their relative died and that person has millions that is to be given but the money should be collected by someone. And whoever sent me that e-mail, trusted me to get that amount of money and that he will pay me for helping me get the money.

An obvious SCAM!

I am not against people from African countries, but those are just a few examples from my own experience. It is not just happening in Africa but throughout the whole world. I think many have received and maybe experienced these kinds of scam too. And I am glad that I prevented myself from being scammed that is why I shared to you some examples to aware and prevent people from being scammed. Are there any similar experiences?

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.