Founded in 1851 as a telegram company, Western Union is one of the oldest businesses in operation today, and one of the leaders in person-to-person money transfers. Western Union is a legitimate company, with a legitimate service that is almost entirely utilized by legitimate people and businesses. There is no way you can lose money through Western Union, so long as the person you are sending money to is a known, trusted individual. However, certain people have been exploiting Western Union's services to trick unknowing victims in to wiring money for goods and services that are poorly rendered, if received at all.            There are many different scams using Western Union as a medium to get money from the victim to the scammer. The Better Business Bureau's Tom Joyce recently published a report about a relatively old scam that has been seeing more and more activity: The Lottery Scam. In this setup, the victim is informed that they have won some sort of a prize. For example, lottery winnings. A check may come with these letters for a large sum of money. The receiver will typically be asked to send back a relatively small portion of it via Western Union wire transfer; $300 from a $5000 check, for example. However, the check is a forgery.             The most important thing to remember is never, under any circumstances, send money via Western Union to companies that you do not know. So long as you exercise caution, awareness and skepticism when dealing with anyone asking for a Western Union or any other person-to-person wire transfer of money, you will not fall victim to these scams.