The 'Winning Numbers Service' Scam

Lottery scammers are always trying to develop new lists of potential victims. One method used is to send out a mailing, or place ads, which invite lottery players to subscribe to a service that has an amazing record of picking winning numbers.

They will claim that they have a computer with artificial intelligence or that they have a renowned mathematician on staff. They typically charge a nominal fee of $20 to $30 for their service. In most cases, the numbers sent to you are merely randomly selected numbers or pre-printed forms containing identical numbers.

By subscribing to their service, they know that you are interested in playing the lotteries so your name will be placed on their lead lists for other scams and/or sold to other scammers and list brokers

Trouble in Paradise

The so-called "New Jackpot Mondial Monaco" lottery became available recently and has since become increasingly popular with families, both in the main island of Tahiti as well as in French Polynesia's outer islands.

But all of them have lost one thousand US dollars each, which is the required sum in order to qualify for a win of $150,000 US dollars "to be won within 90 days".

The game was advertised by way of mailed leaflets which stated "It's very simple. This system relies on arithmetic and logic, it leads all participants to big gains.  But beware! Please only send US dollars, we cannot accept any other form of payment".

 was looking through the letters and the one from Ruth Krammer stood out! Her letter was identical to mine right down to the ticket and serial numbers!