In the last few years, a well-designed travel brochure has been hitting millions of homes, especially in Australia. The publication contains lottery scratch tickets offering complimentary lottery prizes to celebrate a new investment opportunity.
The scratch tickets reveal a prize of $130,000. Since the winning is published in a nice and glossy magazine, several people really believe they hit the jackpot!
The winners are informed there is a $7,000 government tax to pay before the proceeds can be released and the travel company will pay half. The recipient just has to send the other half by wire transfer, to Malaysia or Hong Kong.
The publishers of the brochure require the winners to provide a copy of their passport for authentication, along with bank account details. Indeed, there is no $130,000 after that.
How to avoid: ignore the fact that is a travel brochure. It’s not a real deal, scammers can make everything nowadays look official.