Advance-fee fraud
Definition
A scheme in which the victim is promised a large future payment in exchange for an upfront fee. Variants include the classic 419 fraud, lottery scams, and romance scams where the supposed partner requests money for travel, medical, or customs fees.
Related terms
- Blockchain analytics
- The use of tools such as Chainalysis, Elliptic, or CipherTrace to trace cryptocurrency fund flows across a public ledger. Because most public...
- Business Email Compromise (BEC)
- A fraud in which an attacker impersonates a trusted executive, finance counterpart, or supplier over email to authorise fraudulent wire transfers or...
- Card-not-present (CNP) fraud
- Fraudulent use of payment card data in a transaction where the physical card is absent, typically an online or telephone purchase. The...
- Money mule
- A person who receives fraudulently obtained funds into their bank account and transfers them onward, taking a commission. Mules may be witting...
- Phishing
- A mass deception attack delivered by email, SMS (smishing), or voice call (vishing) in which the attacker impersonates a trusted entity to...
Explained in
- Online Fraud and Financial CybercrimeA scheme in which the victim is promised a large future payment in exchange for an upfront fee. Variants include the classic 419 fraud, lottery scams, and roma...