Lottosend | Lottery Scams Online: How to Avoid Them

A lottery scam usually arrives in the form of an email or letter from an overseas lottery company that you’ve most likely never played claiming that you’ve just won a lot of money. While the delivery and sophistication of the scams have changed over the years, the method has remained the same. There is a great deal of money to be made by the subject of the scam, whether it is lotto jackpots, buried treasure or an inheritance from a long-lost uncle, but only if an amount of money is first sent to them to free up the big money.

Many lottery scammers use the names of legitimate lotteries and corporations (a famous one being the so-called "Microsoft Lottery" scam), this does not mean that the institution is involved; in fact the institution is never involved, and its strong brand name is leveraged to gain your trust. Whether it is the "Jamaican Lottery" or "British National Lottery", there are endless types of “advance fee fraud” scams out there, and you should be aware of them.

In modern day advance fee fraud scams, the play is quite straightforward; the target of the scam has just won the jackpot of a well-reputed lotto, but some sort of fees need to be paid (registration charges, transfer charges, processing charges) in order to release the money. Once those fees have been paid, another letter or email arrives from an official representative of the lottery asking for an even larger sum to access their lottery wins. The letter usually requests that you keep the issue confidential so that you aren’t advised that the letter is in fact a scam. You can imagine how the story plays out, money is forked over but no lotto jackpot is ever forthcoming.

Another form of a lottery scam requests that the subject provide identity details and bank details to supposedly prove that they are indeed the jackpot winner and transfer the money. The scammers then use the info to access the subject’s bank accounts and steal all the money there.

If you find yourself on the receiving end of a suspicious lottery winning solicitation you should:

Never respond with personal details of any kind. Scammers often claim that they only need personal info and bank details in order to transfer the winnings – beware, by providing these details you are potentially exposing yourself to theft of the worst kind.
Contact the lottery organization from which your winnings supposedly originate in order to verify the claim.
Get in touch with a lawyer or accountant for independent advice before doing so.

Preventative Measures

Remember, if it’s too good to be true – it probably is!

First rule of avoiding getting caught up in a scam is to remember that if you didn’t play, or sign up to play a specific lottery then there’s no way you could win.
Deal only with well-known companies when using any 3rd party to partake in lotto games.
Be alert to any party that requests an advance fee in order to claim winnings. You shouldn’t have to pay anything beyond the initial registration fees and ticket costs you paid prior to your win.

You’re Safe with Lottosend

Lottosend is a legitimate messenger service, not a game maker; this means that we do not purport to act on behalf of any official lottery organization but rather act as a go between. We do not make contact with anyone who has not opted into use our lotto courier service, and we do not request additional processing fees to extract winnings.

When you purchase a lotto ticket through Lottosend, you receive a scanned copy of your ticket as proof of purchase. You have the numbers and the name of the lottery you’ve chosen to play to verify any winnings that you may have claim to.

Lottosend values the privacy of our users and we refrain from passing any of our user data on to 3rd parties. To ensure top level protection on our website we make use of advanced security layers which safeguard our users against phishing scams and fraud.

Please read our Lottery FAQs for more information on the Lottosend service.