Hello from FrankonFraud,

This week’s top fraud trends and stories are here 👇

• LinkedIn has lots and lots of fake accounts

• I bought a Legal CPN but got a stolen SSN instead

• Canadian fraud is spiking higher

• Scientists leverage Generative Ai for email fraud risk

• A fraudster fakes terminal cancer

• Primary tradeline fraud is growing

• Student loan scams surge

• Lloyds says Vehicle Scams are up 74%

• Virtual cheating runs rampant at Zwift

• A credit union fraud fighter rockstar emerges

• Scammer’s worst nightmares come true

Lets get to the top stories of the week!

The Guardians Of Authenticity - AI Will Never Eliminate The Fraud Analyst

ChatGPT, FraudGPT, WormGPT, DeepFake Video AI, Voice cloning. AI is all around us, and we’re all a bit afraid of it.

In a deepfake world where you can trust nothing, fraud analysts will become the guardians of authenticity, guiding us to what we can trust and what we cannot.

If you think fraud analysts are done, kaput, and irrelevant, I can’t tell you how wrong you are.

In fact, with the rise of AI, we need more fraud analysts. Tens of thousands more. In the new world, fraud analysts are destined to become the Guardians of Authenticity.

Click On This Link Or Image Below To Read The Blog

Why Can’t LinkedIn Control The Pig Butchering Fake Accounts?

Why does OpenAI have hundreds of Pig Butcherers working for them? They don’t.

But if you trusted LinkedIn, you would think they do.

I found several hundred LinkedIn accounts that must have been created by a cut-and-paste fraudster.

They all had the same resume. They all worked for the same company. They all went to the same school. And many appear to be using stolen pictures.

I Bought A “Legal” CPN for $80. So Why Did They Sell Me a Social Security Number?

Have you heard of a “CPN”? If you haven’t, you should read this article and find out why millions of people are falling for a scam of the ages.

I bought one just to see what all the hoopla is about, but somehow the company sent me someone else’s social security number.

Go figure.

Apparently this company brags that they have sold 1 million of them already.

Click on This Link or Image Below To Read The Blog

From Cars To Credit Cards To Houses, Canadian Fraud Is Like A Rocket

Financial pressure is causing massive amounts of new fraud in Canada. That’s according to Equifax Canada, which is reporting a seismic shift upward of fraud across industries.

• Credit application fraud is up 37% this year

• Auto loan fraud is up 28% this year

• Mortgage fraud is up 18%

Just as here in the US, massive increases in identity theft are to blame. According to Equifax about 70% of the total fraud is due to identity theft.

Click this link or image below to read the release

Lloyds - Fake Car Scams Are Up 74% This Year

Wanna buy a car? Be careful of online advertisements because Lloyds has recorded a 74% surge in the number of reports of vehicle scams in the first half of this year

Fake ads for BMW’s, Audis and Ford Fiesta’s (of all models) are regularly popping up all over social media.

The scammers take pictures of real cars and post advertisements that are too good to be true. Once they get the deposit or the full payment for vehicle, they block payer and skip town.

Scientists Tackle Email Fraud Risk With Clever Generative AI Technique

Are you a fraud analyst that can instantly spot a fake email address? This might interest you.

Emily Saitta of Socure posted an interesting blog on how data scientists at the company used a clever Generative AI approach to unlock new insights into fake emails.

The scientists trained a neural language model on billions of email handles to identify what they refer to as “perplexity”. It measures how improbable an email handle’s word or character sequence is compared to legitimate patterns.

According to the scientists, high perplexity suggests a fraudulent, randomized handle. The sequence information improves Socure’s ability to mimic human judgment in assessing email handle legitimacy.

Fraudster Fakes Terminal Cancer To Get Into Gambling Tournament

He took a gamble and people called his bluff.

Rob Mercer faked a claim that he had cancer so that he could raise $30,000 to enter a gambling tournament in Vegas.

He was trying to raise enough funds to meet the $10,000 buy-in for the No-limit Hold’em World Championship. Even a fellow poker player from Arizona who suffers from chronic illness donated $2,500 to get him there.

People became suspicious of him when he was asked about his illness and his answers started to get “very vague”.

Click on this link or image below to read the story

Good Read 📖 Not Even Lance Armstrong Could Out Cheat Eddy Hoole

Are you a Peloton user? You will love the next story Karisse Hendrick sent me if you are.

Karisse says we can all learn about the value of trust in online platforms from what happened here with this one.

A Cycling Platform Rife With Cheaters

Launched in 2014, Zwift started as an app to help recreational cyclists stay fit through the winter.

Like Peloton, which offers a personal training experience in the comfort of your home, Zwift users connect their stationary bikes to a fictional world called Watopia, where riders’ avatars race around a screen, and live statistics for speed and power are displayed on a leaderboard in real-time.

The cycling platform has amassed over 5,000,000 users, many of whom are professional cyclists who compete in fiercely competitive worldwide championships.

But according to one man - Luciano Pollastri - the platform is rife with cheaters - over 10% of users cheat, according to his analysis. Riders have reported over 50 ways to cheat the software with outrageous techniques like blowing hair dryers on the sensors to make it look like they were pedaling faster.

Not even Lance Armstrong at the top of his doping is any match to the strength and power of world-class Zwift cheater Eddy Hoole!

If you want to read the whole article, dive into the fascinating world of online cycling cheating and one man’s quest to end virtual cheating!

Primary Tradelines Are A Shadowy Fraud Spreading Like A Bad Virus

Here is the hidden credit repair fraud of the year that is probably slipping right under your noses.

Credit repair companies sell primary tradelines for high-end luxury cars and even homes and post them to people’s credit bureaus.

I wrote a blog about how illegal primary tradelines are spreading like a virus, and it’s only become more commonplace over the last few months.

Check out this masked man on Youtube selling them.

With Payments Due In A Week, Student Loan Scams Are Surging

With student loan payments restarting on October 1st, there are millions of anxious borrowers that are not looking forward to having less money in their bank accounts.

Student loan robocall scams are surging ahead of the date, putting millions of borrowers in harms way.

Most of the callers entice you to setup a bogus loan program, according to the FTC. If a victim does sign up, they’ll likely have to pay a fee in advance. Scammers already have some information about their victims like SSN’s or the school they went to, so they are able to convince the borrower they are legitimate.

Fraud Fighter Unlocks The Secret To Success With This Brilliant Advice

When she was a kid playing cops and robbers, Hailey Windham was always the cop.

So when she took a job as a Bank Teller in 2014, it was only natural that she evolved into a fraud fighter. Less than 10 years later she finds herself the Financial Crimes Program Manager at SAFE Credit Union.

And I think she has unlocked one big secret I don’t think many fraud fighter realize is maybe the most important part of fighting fraud 👉 “The Story”

“With fraud, you have to sell the story,” says Hailey, “You have to make it relatable so everyone can understand what is going on.”

How true is this? It also happens to be about 99% of the reason I started FrankonFraud. I wanted to tell the stories so people understood.

Well Hailey was recently recognized in the new wave of Credit Union Rockstars of 2023. It’s nice to see a fraud fighter receive this sort of recognition!

Breaking Boxes. Every Scammers Nightmare Just Came True

Do you know Ronnie Tokazowski? You should. In fact, if you are a fraud or scam fighter you should connect with him on LinkedIn and get him in your network.

Ronnie has devoted the last 13 years defending the internet in some of the most creative ways imaginable ranging from threat research to scam analysis to networking, to proactive scammer detection.

And now he started his own LLC to provide consulting, public speaking, video content and anything else the industry needs in the fight against scams.

In addition to terrifying scammers, Ronnie also supports victims, advocating for victims of romance scams, cyber fraud, and other forms of victimization, providing support for their emotional recovery.

Thanks for taking the time to read this week’s newsletter.

I hope you have an amazing week!

FrankonFraud