Lottery scams work because they borrow the most powerful feeling there is — the fantasy of a windfall — and turn it against you. They're among the most common frauds reported to the FTC, and they've grown more convincing as scammers lift real logos and language from Powerball and Mega Millions. The good news: nearly every version collapses against a single rule. Here's how to recognize them.
The scams that keep working
They come in a handful of reliable shapes:
- "You've won!" (advance-fee). A call, email, letter, or DM says you won a lottery or sweepstakes — but to collect, you must first pay "taxes," "fees," or "customs charges." As the FTC puts it: "If you pay, you'll lose your money and find out there was no prize."
- Foreign-lottery offers. Messages about a foreign lottery you never entered. The FTC is blunt: these "are almost certainly a scam. And it's illegal to play a foreign lottery through the mail or phone."
- Impersonation on social media. Mega Millions has warned that scammers "lifted logos, photos and language from the Mega Millions website to make themselves look legitimate," posing as officials via DMs, comments, and fake "special drawings."
- Fake checks. You're sent a check, told to deposit it, and asked to wire back a portion for "fees." The check later bounces — and you owe the bank the full amount.
- Prize-claim phishing. A "claim form" that harvests your bank account, card, or Social Security number.
The red flags
You don't need to identify which scam it is. You need to spot the tells, and the FTC's are worth memorizing:
- You have to pay to get the prize. "If you have to pay, it's not a prize… Real prizes are free." Any request for taxes, shipping, processing, or customs fees up front is a scam, full stop.
- You're told to pay by gift card, wire transfer, or crypto. "Only a scammer will tell you to pay by wiring money… putting money on a gift card… or paying with cryptocurrency." Add payment apps — Cash App, Zelle, PayPal — to that list.
- You're asked for financial details. "There's absolutely no reason to give your bank account or credit card number, or your Social Security number, to claim any prize."
- You didn't enter. You can't win a lottery you never played a ticket in.
- You were contacted out of the blue, with urgency, pressure, or a request to keep the "win" secret.
- A check you must deposit and partly send back. This is always a fake-check scam.
The one rule that defeats them all
Every legitimate lottery says the same thing: you never pay to collect a prize you've already won. Mega Millions: "No real lottery tells winners to put up their own money in order to collect a prize they have already won. If you have to pay a fee to collect your winnings, you haven't won." Powerball: lotteries "will never ask you to pay a fee to collect a Powerball prize," and "will never contact you via email or telephone… unless you specifically entered an official lottery promotion."
The Texas Lottery adds the structural reason it can't be real: "the agency has no way of knowing winners' identities until they come forward with their tickets." A lottery literally cannot call to tell you that you won a draw game — it doesn't know who you are until you present the ticket. The New York Lottery likewise states it "never requires you to pay money to claim your prize."
So the test is simple: if someone contacts you about a lottery win and money needs to flow toward them, it's a scam. No exceptions.
Foreign-lottery offers are always a scam
This one deserves its own line because it's so common. Legitimate US lotteries do not solicit players in other countries, and it is illegal to play a foreign lottery by mail or phone from within the US. If you're outside the US and receive a "US lottery" prize notice you didn't enter, or you're in the US and get a "Spanish/Canadian/UK lottery" win by email — ignore it and report it. (Real cross-border play means buying a ticket in person while visiting; see Can Non-US Citizens and Tourists Win the Lottery?.)
If you're targeted
Do the following, in order:
- Don't pay anything, don't share bank/card/SSN details, and don't deposit or forward any check you were sent.
- Report it to the FTC at ReportFraud.ftc.gov.
- Report to your state attorney general and the state lottery's security office (for example, the Texas Lottery's fraud line, or the New York Lottery's scams page). If mail was involved, it can also go to the USPS Postal Inspection Service.
- In Canada, report to the Canadian Anti-Fraud Centre — and note the CRA's own warning that you never pay tax or fees to receive lottery or sweepstakes winnings.
The bottom line
Real winning is quiet and unglamorous: you check a ticket you actually bought, you sign it, and you go to the lottery to claim it. Nobody calls you first, nobody needs a fee, and nobody legitimate wants your Social Security number over email. Hold onto that, and the fantasy someone's dangling in front of you loses all its power — because the moment money is supposed to move toward the "lottery," you already have your answer.