Dear Mr. Morrison,

THIS IS NOT AN AUTOMATED RESPONSE

Thank you for your submission of information via the FBI.Gov Web site.  Inasmuch as the FBI receives reports of this type of activity on a regular basis there is no need to forward any such additional emails to the FBI.

A review of the information you provided revealed that you are being approached over the Internet to participate in one of many variations of an advance fee scheme being perpetrated by individuals from various West African nations, particularly Nigeria. Victims have lost substantial funds in the past and all requests for travel to foreign locations should be ignored.  The United States Secret Service (USSS) has developed an excellent, detailed description of this fraud scheme, which can be accessed at http://www.secretservice.gov/alert419.shtml. If you have been victimized by one of these schemes, please forward appropriate written documentation to the USSS, Financial Crimes Division, 950 H Street, NW, Washington, D.C. 20223, or telephone (202) 406-5850. We encourage you to share this Web page with family and friends. Your continued cooperation in this and other matters is greatly appreciated.

You do not need to forward the emails to us.  Also, if you know that you are receiving Spam mail, it is advisable not to open the mail because the sender will validate your email address even if you don’t reply to the email.

For your information, the Internet Tip Line (ITL) was created on 9/11/01, in response to the terrorist attacks upon America.  We quickly established a mechanism for the public to submit information to the FBI via the Internet, and we received our first tip at 10:31 AM that first day.  Director Mueller has since made the ITL a permanent part of FBI
operations, and we have thus far received over 600,000 tips from around the globe, from which thousands of leads have been sent to FBI Field and Legal Attaché offices for action.

Initially, almost 100% of the tips received were related to the terrorist attacks; however, now approximately 45% of all tips received are related to almost every other FBI criminal program, e.g., drug trafficking, organized crime, money laundering, pyramid schemes, child pornography, fugitives, bank robbery.

Our operation is completely automated and paperless.  Submitted tips are received immediately, reviewed within minutes and prioritized by trained Professional Support personnel, and Agents set action leads within the hour, as appropriate.

I encourage you to share this information with your family, friends, and co-workers, and encourage them to not hesitate to submit information they may deem of interest to the FBI.  Again, thank you for taking the time to forward this report to us.

IMPORTANT – NOTE THE FOLLOWING:

The FBI does not maintain an email address to submit information or attachments to directly; therefore, please do not reply directly to this message via your email client.  The FBI maintains an automated system that is designed to track all information received to ensure that all tips are addressed in a timely and efficient manner.  Therefore, please visit the FBI.GOV Web site again should you have occasion to submit additional information.   We WILL NOT open or respond to “reply” email.

Sincerely,

David N. Rushing/cwc
Supervisory Special Agent
FBI Headquarters
Washington, D.C.