I'm Rich!!

[This is a Malaysian ringgit. Apparently, quite a few will be coming my way soon. Image credit: BBC News]

Malaysia wrote to me today:

MALAYSIA PRIZE AWARD DEPARTMENT
Government Accredited Licensed Promoters,
1 Plough Place, MALAYSIA XXXX XXX MALAYSIA
REFERENCE No: ASL- WF97 – 5G3
BATCH No: OX9T – 7T5T – D3N

Attn:Sir/Madam.

Top of days greetings to you.Finally today, we announce that
you are one of the winners of the ELECTRONIC LOTTERY PROGRAMS.

held on 14th AUGUST,2008.Your company and your personal
e-mail addresses, attached to ticket number: 7-1-8-36-4-22
under agent ID: 18 and lucky ball number 7363789,which
consequently won in the Tenth lottery category.

You have therefore been awarded a lump sum pay out of
US$1,500,000.00 (One Million,Five Hundred Thousand United States DOLLARS).

The online draws was conducted by a random selection of emailaddresses
from an exclusive list of 29,031 E-mail addresses of individuals and
corporate bodies picked by an advanced automated random
computer search from the internet. No ticket were sold but all email
addresses were assigned to different ticket numbers for representation
and privacy.

This is to encourage our prominent and consistent Microsoft
Internet Explorer users all over the world, and for the Continues
use of E-mail.

Your fund has been insured with your identification number
{CPEL/OWN/9876}. To claim your winning prize, you must first
contact the claims department by email for Processing and remittance
of your prize to you.

Customer Service Unit,
Mr.Ibrahim Nasiru
TEL:+XXXXXXXX
EMAIL:xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx@yahoo.com.invalid

FILL THE FORM BELOW WITH YOUR DATAS

1.Full Name:______________________________
2.Address: ______________________________
3.Nationality:______________________________
4.Age:______________________________
5.Occupation:____________________
6.Phone:________________________
7.State of Origin:_________________
8.Country:______________________

NOTE: Ensure to quote your Reference Numbers in all your
communication with your claims agent.All winnings must be
claimed not later than 14 days, thereafter unclaimed funds would be
included in the next stake. Remembe r to quote your reference

information in all correspondence.

Yours Faithfully,
Mrs.citi Farah
Lottery Co-ordinator

[I've removed the addresses, since it's possible that those are legitimate addresses completely unrelated to this scam.]

Of course, there are any one of a number of reasons to be suspicious of this letter:

• I never use Internet Explorer if I can avoid it.


• I've never been within 3,000 miles of Malaysia.


• I don't know anyone who lives there.


• It came to my Cujo359 address, not one of my "real" e-mail addresses. Who sends a prize letter to an obviously fictional address?
  

There's no better way to end the day than a badly-written scam letter claiming you've become independently wealthy. At least, there's no better way I've experienced lately.

Oh, and guys, I'll take my prize money in Euros.