Weird emails - 'assistance please'

[Anz]

I've been getting weird e-maisl to my hotmail account recently. I've had about 3 in the last few months. The subject lines are fairly similar ('hello please' and 'assistance please') and the content is 'Hello, a (semi-famous) relative of mine has recently died, and I found he deposited a certain amount of money somewhere I can't get to. If you will help me to get to the money, I am willing to give you a share'. For example one email is supposedly from Irena Kovac, the widow ofMiodrag Kovac, former Yugoslav Minister of Health. The email says her husband died. I looked it up, and it turned out to be true. I was wondering if anyone else had received similar emails, and whether anyone knew if they had a purpose. The only contact left is the email address, and there were no attachments with any of the three, so I don;t think they're any kind of virus.

[sft42]

This is just another version of a con that has been about for many moons. My father got a letter similar to this about 10 -12 years ago saying a distant relative had died and was he interested in this firm of solicitors in australia searching out if he had a claim to the "substantial" estate. All he had to do was send off a modest cheque to cover their expenses in this matter and.......needless to say as a good tight-fisted scot the letter was seen as a scam and after checking with granny to see if we did have any dim and distant relatives in that neck of the woods it was thrown in the bin. About 6 weeks later the daily record exposed a big scam involving loads of people with our surname. So all this is, i would guess is an updated version of the same old con just picking a real person who has pegged it then trying to cash in on their misfortune. My advice Hit the delete button.

[BenDToy]

Anz - this sounds like yet another variation of the "419" Nigerian Advanced Fee Fraud which has netted untold millions for the perpetrators. Do not contact them, even to tell them to s** off. For further info see the following http://www.419fraud.com

[WendyW]

It is a scam .. sometimes it says Nigeria other times Yugoslavia. If you reply, I understand that they ask for details of your Bank Account etc then they start asking for small sums of money .. then larger and larger. There was a program on TV about it.

[rja211077]

as posted by another correspondent in response to another question, here is an excellent website on all such urban myths, scams, etc: www.snopes.com