[imagsource: Michigan Lottery]

Not everything in your spam folder is junk.

Let that be a lesson because it could mean the difference between millions lost or millions gained.

The story behind this valuable lesson comes via Laura Spears, who was checking her spam folder for something when she happened to discover that she had won $3 million from the lottery.

Yes, that is close to R46 million. In the junk folder. That could have been permanently deleted and never claimed.

The 55-year-old Michigan resident had purchased a Mega Millions ticket online from the state lottery for the December 31, 2021 drawing.

She said that she saw an ad on Facebook that the Mega Millions jackpot was getting pretty high, so she went ahead and bought a ticket, CNN reported:

“A few days later, I was looking for a missing email from someone, so I checked the spam folder in my email account,” she told lottery officials.

“That’s when I saw an email from the lottery saying I had won a prize.”

“I couldn’t believe what I was reading, so I logged in to my Lottery account to confirm the message in the email. It’s all still so shocking to me that I really won $3 million!”

She managed to match five numbers, which claimed the $1 million prize, plus she got the Megaplier, which multiplied her winnings threefold, per the BBC.

Look at her go:

Image: Michigan Lottery

Now Spears gets to retire early, which she has every intention to do, while also sharing some of the winnings with her family.

But most importantly, her future also entails a more rigorous checking of her emails.

She’s also added Michigan Lottery to her ‘safe senders’ list, you know, just in case.

I definitely wouldn’t advise assuming every email about winning the lottery, or inheriting a fortune from a long-lost relative, is genuine.

[sources:cnn&bbc]