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New Fraud Schemes And How One Man Said A Lost Card Report Ruined His Life
New Fraud Schemes And Life Wreckers
Frank McKenna
March 13, 2023
Hello from FrankonFraud,
It’s daylight savings time! If you’re like me, you’re probably up early, grinding to stop all these new fraud schemes that keep popping up everywhere.
My good friend and fraud-fighting compadre, Andrew Manuel, sent me a picture from MRC in Vegas last week, which I really liked.
Check out these Fraud Fighter Whack A Mole Video Games! 🐹. This is what we do all day long right?
There were lots of interesting announcements this week and some devastating ones as well.
The FBI Alerted that scams and pig butchering are growing rapidly, a man in Brazil accuses a US politician of masterminding a sophisticated card skimming operation, and check fraud keeps making the front page news.
I know some of you are still reeling from the Silicon Valley Bank collapse, I know I am still a little dumbfounded by it. I hope our friends in other fraud startups and tech companies are not impacted 🙏 .
Let’s check out the top FrankonFraud articles of the week.
Man Says Bank Wrecked His Life When They Gave Him Fraud Credits He Never Asked For
Something about this guy’s call into Chase to report his card lost must have glitched the system because what happened after that called reportedly “ruined his life”.
Reddit user, ApartmentNo3272 claims that Chase Bank “legitimately ruined his life” when they misreported over 200 transactions to merchants as fraudulent.
“The transactions were valid”, he said. He had only called Chase to report his card lost so he could get a new one. But the Chase representative took it upon themselves to reverse 6 months of charges, crediting him back over $14,000 in the process.
There was NO fraud, he said. He just needed a new card and now his life is ruined because many businesses are coming after him for the money or cancelling his services
New Apple/FedEx Scheme Is Causing A High Volume of Fraud
An interesting post from Dan Rayburn on Linkedin caught my eye.
According to him, Apple and FedEx support and store employees have told me there is currently a “high volume” of fraud taking place without either company knowing how it is being done.
Someone re-routed the delivery of his MacBook ordered from Apple’s website to a different address, where they tried to pick it up at a FedEx store 40 minutes away from him. And since Apple’s ordering system doesn’t speak to FedEx’s tracking system, when a re-routing package request is made, Apple doesn’t know about it.
A new Fraud Hack Called “Poor Mans First Class” Has The Internet In An Uproar
A new life hack is making the rounds on Tik Tok, and airlines aren’t happy about it. The Tik Tok influencer “NDAInternet” has 800,000 followers, and he has the internet in an uproar with his hack.
It’s called Poor Man’s First Class.
And while it sounds like a genius way to get a whole row of seats to yourself, it’s also fraud and can get road warriors in big trouble with the airlines.
Politician Accused Of Running A Major Credit Card Skimming Operation
Face it; this guy can’t seem to stay away from scandals; this one, however, probably shocked his most ardent supporters.
This week, a Brazilian man named Gustavo Ribeiro Trelha reported that his former roommate, scandal magnet George Santos, recruited him into his sophisticated skimming operation and paid him $100 daily to install and remove skimming from ATM machines.
“Santos taught me how to skim card information and how to clone cards. He gave me all the materials and taught me how to put skimming devices and cameras on ATM machines””
3,000 Texas Real IDs Shipped To Criminal Fraud Gang in New York For Trafficking Scheme
Criminal Chinese gangs operating out of New York infiltrated the Texas.Gov Driver’s License website and took over 4,000 accounts in the names of Asian Texans.
Having sourced breached data on the web, they could answer the password and security questions by guessing the correct answers. They sold the real driver’s license documents to immigrants in China, who would then enter the state illegally and, in some cases, become indentured slaves.
Pig Butchering Scams Are Now A $3 Billion Threat. This Is Hitting BEC Levels Now
The FBI is releasing more alerts on Pig Butchering scams, and the loss levels they are reporting look eerily similar to what we saw with BEC attacks about 10 years ago.
I first reported on Pig Butchering Scams last year when I saw an article on it in the South Morning China Post. At the time, slaves were being brought into China from Cambodia and were forced into scams.
It’s now looking like one of the fastest growing scam types out there.
New Xenomorph Malware Can Steal Passwords From 400 Banks’ Mobile Apps
A new dangerous piece of malware targets 400 banks’ mobile apps to steal passwords from their banking customers.
The malware which was originally focused on targets in Europe is now spreading.
ThreatFabric, the security specialist explains that “Xenomorph is now able to completely automate the whole fraud chain, from infection to funds exfiltration” which makes it one of the most advanced and dangerous Android malware trojans currently in circulation. Besides 400 banking and financial institutions, it can also now steal cryptocurrency from several crypto wallets.
Thanks to tipster Mary Ann Miller for sending me this report.
Fraud Fighter Of The Week - Sgt Darren Schlosser Of The Houston Vehicle Police Department
Gone in 60 seconds? Not when this fraud fighter is on duty.
As fraud fighters, we all know our relationships with Law Enforcement are critical to stopping the bad guys. And one of the most amazing fraud-fighting heroes I have ever met out there is Sgt Darren Schlosser with the Houston Police Department.
He is one of those guys that does his job for the love of stopping fraud and helping people. He educates thousands of consumers and car dealers in his free time because he just wants help to eradicate fraud in Houston.
He created a program called “Fraud In Progress” “ a fraud hotline where car dealers can call the police department and he will have squad cars at the dealership in minutes, ready to stop the fraud perpetrator in their tracks.
This guy is simply amazing!
Thanks for reading, and I hope you all have a fantastic and productive week fighting fraud.
My best,