These emails claim to be from some official sounding organisation such as a foreign bank or foreign government department.

There are typically three parts to these  scam emails

1. A claim to be officially searching for an heir
2. Statements or questions that lead you into believing that you could be the heir to a fortune
3. A request for identity information

A typical such email to the Brooklands Radio station claims to be from a consulting company working for Ivesco Banco in Spain and they have been engaged to verify the heir to a very large sum of money remaining in an account at Ivesco Banco.

Then it states that the client account holder has a name matching mine. It doesn’t say what that name is of course as the email goes out to many thousands if not millions of people.

Then comes the part where they have to convince me that I could be the heir.

Question 1 says: Are you aware of any relation who may have lived in Spain?

Question 2 says: Are you aware of any investment made by your relative?

Then it goes on to ask Can you assume the status of the heir to the deceased?

Many people will have  or had a relative that lived in Spain for part or all of their Life or at least visited Spain.  And the email asks if you can assume the status of heir – that leads to false thoughts of Yes I can do that (and become very rich)

So the scam works.

Of course there is no money, this is a 419 scam meaning the scammers convince you it is real then will need payment up front in some form to release the funds. But the funds don’t exist. You lose.

Don’t try to be an heir unless you actually knew the deceased person.