Good news, oh lucky winner!

You’ve won a car, laptop, and a frankly terrifying amount of money after being entered in a prize draw.

Well, that’s what the senders of the below missive want you to think, should you open it up in your mailbox.

Titled “Dear Lucky Winner” and sent from the so-called “BMW Lottery Department”, the mail reads as follows:

Dear Winner,




Name : Rev. William Christopher
Emai (bwmoffice2ATgmailDOTcom)
Phone Number: +27


1. Name In Full :
2. Residential Address :
3. Nationality :
4. Age :
5. Occupation :
6. Direct Phone :
7. Present Country :
8. Email address :
9. Pin code Number BMW:


Apart from the fact that they’re using Gmail for the official claims department address, I quite liked how they’ve managed to typo it as “BWM Office” instead of BMW. There’s no magical pile of cash at the end of this one (or a magical laptop or car, for that matter). All we have here is an attempt to drag a victim into the world of 419 / money mule scamming.

This one has been bouncing across mailboxes in various formats for years [1], [2], [3]. We can trace this one back to around 2006, though of course the various rewards and prize money offered differ from mail to mail. One constant is the BMW themed coat-tail riding, with many pieces of spam citing the fake “secret pin code number” – a dead giveaway that something isn’t quite right.

However you come across this one, and no matter what they’re offering, you should speed it towards your Trash folder with no delay.

Christopher Boyd