Addressing consumer fraud around the world. The Baker Fraud Report focuses on mass marketing fraud – where victims never meet the fraudster in person but communicate over the phone, though the mail, or on the internet.
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There are no “Safe” Accounts: A wide variety of scams, particularly those that impersonate law enforcement and banks, are claiming that your money is at risk of being stolen by bad actors or seized by a government and that you need to transfer your money to an account where it will be protected. There is no such thing! Please warn people that anyone that wants you to turn over your money is a CROOK.
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Gold – A new Trend. I am seeing more and more scammers who are asking victims to pay with gold. And it appears that this tactic is being headed by scammers from India. This is a huge red flag of fraud (no legitimate operation will ask for funds this way) and of course this makes it harder to follow the money.
Fraud Trend to note: It is becoming clear that groups from China are handling the money collection for scammers from India. I’ve seen this in a number of recent cases, but it has not been commented or reported on so far. Sometimes it involves gift cards; at other times it does not. Let me know if you have seen or know more about this.
Crypto fraud coming from Nigeria is up 1000%; deepfake fraud coming from China up 964%
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Massive data breach: hackers get all data on almost all AT&T customers
Chainalysis releases in depth study of money laundering through crypto for fraud and other crimes
Text message scams are exploding; 60 billion in June alone; that’s 60 per person in the US
US Treasury releases money laundering risk assessment
Did you know that there is a 1906 federal law that exempts interstate movers from state consumer protection laws? This should be fixed. As I detailed in my study for the BBB there are criminal gangs that advertise cheaper prices for moving services online, but after they load the goods on a truck they demand a lot more money. And if they arrive when they say that will, they often demand still more, and drive off if people refuse to pay. This is a major problem. The 1906 Carmack Amendment may have made sense at one time, but has clearly long outlived its usefulness. For more on the history of this see here.
Interpol announces global fraud crackdown “First Light”
Bob Sullivan: Crooks are now appearing IN PERSON to pick up money from scam victims
India: Police raid call center claiming to be US Marshalls and telling people that their Social Security Number had been compromised; 77 arrested FTC brings new case against $200 million free trial offer fraud
Canada: Toronto man shoots and kills two who he believed were scammers that took him for $1 million
Troubling new opinion from the 9th circuit court of appeals on fraud. In US v. Milheiser the Court recently reversed the criminal conviction of several toner scammers. For years these companies called offices, told the receptionists that they were their regular supplier of toner for their copier, that the price was going up, but that they would send “more” at the old, cheaper, price. The victim companies had never in fact dealt with these scammers before. A jury convicted them of mail fraud.
The Court reversed the convictions, concluding that victims in fact did receive toner at the price disclosed in the call, thus concluding that the defendant’s lies were not “material” to victims. Needless to say, this decision is bound to cause trouble in future consumer protection cases, and I believe it is wrongly decided. But it reminds us that no matter what the legal standard is, it is important to have a solid theory of consumer injury – to explain why the lies matter to consumers.
