Ooh, the FBI's director has written to me personally. Not.

Some scammers try to evade spam filters by putting the spam payload into a zipped attachment. Didn't work. Messages like this are always scams. Delete them, don't reply, don't be fooled. But you can enjoy a laugh at them, such as by the idea that the director of the FBI would send you an email from a German domain, with a reply-to address somewhere in the Indian Ocean.

Here's the contents of the email:

From: "FBI Washington DC" fbi4@wp9932uk5.homepage.t-online.de

Subject: 2011 NOTICE REPORT

Reply-To: fbidepartment08@qatar.io

WARNING: YOU SHOULDN'T DISREGARD THIS INSTRUCTIONS GIVEN TO YOU ON ATTACHED MESSAGE FILE.

ROBERT S. MUELLER, III

FBI, DIRECTOR.

The attachment was called FBI REPORT.zip. Unzipping it (which you should never do, but I have secure tools for doing this) revealed a rich-text file called FBI UPDATE.rtf. Here's what it said:

From: Federal Bureau of Investigation

Dept: Anti-Terrorist & Monetary Crimes Division

Office: Washington, D.C. Headquarters

Address: J. Edgar Hoover Building 93 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW Washington, D.C. 20535-0001

Date: 11/04/2011

Attention: BENEFICIARY,

This is to bring to your notice that my office has taking over all the money transfer originated from any part of Africa and European countries as contract payment, fund inheritance or lottery winning due to unauthorized/incapability of financial institutions/security companies in releasing such huge sum of money result of fraud, terrorist and money laundry activities going on World Wide.

We sum of Ten Millions US Dollars each victim. This includes every foreign contractor that may have not received his or her contract sum and people that have had an unfinished transaction, people who have inheritance to claim or international businesses that failed due to instability of government in some part of Africa etc.

We found your name in our list as one of the beneficiaries and that is why we are contacting you, this has been agreed upon and has been signed. These also indicate that the Diplomatic Immunity Seal of Transfer (DIST) often referred to as a criminal history record or rap sheet, is a listing of certain information taken from fingerprint submissions retained by the FBI in connection with arrests and, in some instances, federal employment, naturalization, or military service. This condition is valid until 3 days after which the funds shall be confiscated and legal action will be taken against you.

Guarantee: funds will be released upon confirmation of the DIST document. Final instruction given below;

1. Credit payment instruction: irrevocable credit guarantee.

2. Beneficiary has full power when validation is cleared.

3. Beneficiaries Bank in can only release funds.

4. upon confirmation from the World Bank / United Nations.

5. Bearers must clear Bank protocol and validation request.

We have confirmed that the amount required to procure your document which is called the Diplomatic Immunity Seal of Transfer (DIST) will cost you a total of $2,350USD only and the fee should be paid directly to the payment office in United State via Western Union Money Transfer OR MoneyGram. Below is the contact person of the payment in United State and who will process your transaction.

Contact Information;

Payment centre.

Name: Mr. Ronke Phillips

E-mail: mr.ronke.phillips@gmail.com

Contact Mr. Ronke Phillips of finance payment centre, for details regarding the release of your fund to your own Personal Bank Account with the following information’s below:

Full Name:

Address:

City:

State:

Zip Code:

Country:

Sex:

Date of Birth:

Direct Email:

Direct Phone Number:

Current Occupation:

Once you have sent the required information to Mr. Ronke Phillips, he will contact you with instructions on how to make the payment of $2,350USD only for the procurement of your (DIST) document, to enable her expedite action on the processing and release of your payment without any further delay.

You have hereby been authorized /guaranteed by the federal bureau of investigation to commence towards completing this transaction, as there shall be no delay once payment for the (DIST) document has been made to the authorized agent.

Note: We have requested for the DIST document to make available the most complete and update records possible for the enhancement of public safety, welfare and security of society while recognizing the importance of individual privacy rights. If you fail to provide the document to us, we will charge you with the financial crimes. The United Nations department of justice order 556-73 establishes rules and regulations for the subject of an FBI identification record to obtain a copy of his or her own record for review. The FBI Criminal Justice Information Service (CJIS) division processes these requests to check illegal activities and once you have completed payment of $1,350USD to the agent in charge of this transaction, you're advised to keep us posted to enable us follow up with the release of your payment and act fast.

Regards,

Federal Bureau Investigation.

Robert S. Mueller III,

FBI, Director.