Mohammed Samad Ali received an eight month custodial sentence, suspended for two years, and 200 hours unpaid work at the Old Bailey today (Thursday 13 February 2014) after he admitted posting five adverts offering cheap car insurance on the classifieds website in a bid to dupe drivers into paying for phoney policies. Link to article
Category: Latest Fraud News
The cost of online dating fraud
As the use of the internet for dating increases, so do the number of scams associated with it . . . and the amount of money lost. In the UK, this type of fraud is costing the victims a heart-breaking £24.5million per year, with over 2,800 people reporting online dating related crimes in 2013 alone. […]
Cyber crime prevention
UTTER the words “cyber crime” and many minds will conjure up an image of an awkward teenager, tapping away in their bedroom well into the early hours. But cyber crime can be much scarier than that. Threats today also come from criminal networks and foreign governments that deploy cyber weapons. Some of these assailants are […]
Hotel operator investigating data security breach
White Lodging Services Corp. is investigating a potential credit-card security breach. The hotel management company has 171 hotels in its portfolio, include 78 properties under Marriott International’s Courtyard and Residence Inn brands. White Lodging “has experienced unusual fraud patterns in connection with its systems that process credit card transactions at a number of hotels across […]
Fake vouchers and how to avoid fraud
Vouchers and coupons give customers key incentives to develop their interest in a brand but as the appeal of the marketing lever rises so do the stakes around misuse, counterfeiting and scams. Link to article
Hackers caught selling Target card data
Eastern European cyber criminals have been caught selling customer data stolen during a raid on US retailer Target, say security researchers at FireEye. The Target breach is believed to have occurred between 27 November and 15 December. It saw hackers break into Target’s systems and compromise over 40 million credit and debit card accounts. Link […]
Police ransomware warning
Europol’s European Cybercrime Centre has warned internet users to remain vigilant against the “exponential” growth in police ransomware, which tricks users into handing over cash to criminals. The scam uses malware that displays warnings on a user’s computer pretending to be from a law enforcement agency and claims that because the user has engaged in […]
Travel agency scams
A Burlington County judge on Friday sentenced Daryl Turner of Marlton to seven years in prison for running a bogus travel operation that exploited hundreds of victims. Superior Court Judge Terrence R. Cook Jr. also ordered Turner and his wife, Robyn Bernstein, to pay $2.5 million in restitution, and sentenced Bernstein to five years of […]
Police smash financial cyber crime gang
Pan-European cyber crime fighting agency EC3 has been hailed after Polish police arrested five Bulgarians accused of electronic payment card fraud targeting mainly UK citizens. European policy body Europol said three of the gang were caught red-handed – two carrying out illegal electronic payment card transactions at automated teller machines (ATMs) and one in the […]
Air Miles/WestJet/Expedia Fake Points
Everyone uses Expedia all over the world, while WestJet and AirMiles are companies mostly used in North America. Air Miles is a great reward system existing in Canada, Spain, Great Britain, Netherlands, and the Middle East, by which collectors get points for specific purchases they make. Link to article
Cybercrime costing UK £27bn a year
The last few years have been particularly difficult for small and medium sized companies who – like the global economy – have had had to fight their way back from the worst economic recession of a generation. In order to survive, businesses have had to take an extremely critical view of themselves, streamlining processes and […]
Man Scams Airline for Year of Free Meals
A man in China discovered his first-class airline ticket could get him more than just a flight. He used the voucher to score free meals and drinks nearly every day for a year—all courtesy of the VIP airport lounge. A Malaysian Chinese newspaper reports the man changed his flight itinerary more than 300 times within […]
The people most at risk from identity theft
Could you be a target for identity fraudsters? Some 4 million people in the UK have been a victim of this crime, and 80,000 fell victim in the last year alone, so there’s a growing chance that fraudsters could have you in their sights. However, there are seven groups of people who are far more […]
5 years in prison for Disney World ticket scam
Senior U.S. District Judge Gregory A. Presnell sentenced Werawat Isaraphanich to 5 years in federal prison for access device fraud Monday. Isaraphanich, 38, of New York, was also ordered to serve a 3-year term of supervised release following his incarceration, and to pay more than $323,000 to the victims of his crime. Link to article
Global cybercrime dominated by 50 groups
Cybercrime in 2013 was dominated by a core of around 50 active groups, including Russian and Chinese ‘threat actors’ whose activities are only now coming to light, a report from monitoring firm CrowdStrike has found. Using an approach that foregrounds the ‘threat actors’ above the malware itself, the firm divides groups according to whether they […]
Plugging the security gaps
Headlines such as ‘huge data thefts hit Korea’ or ‘Ivory Coast cracks down on cybercrime’ are never far from the news agenda, yet despite the huge threat that cybercrime poses many governments are still struggling to protect themselves. The potential impact of an attack on our critical national infrastructure and intelligence systems could rock the […]
Mother bullied into credit card fraud
A young mother who was bullied into carrying out a credit card fraud at a Newton Abbot store has escaped jail. Leona Thompson tried to escape by giving police a false identity but was caught when a quick witted police officer spotted a silver bracelet with her own name on her wrist. Link to article
Fraud Review 2013
The analysis of fraud trends during 2013 by CIFAS – the UK’s Fraud Prevention Service reveals a surprising mix of apparently good and equally alarming news about fraud. Overall, fraud levels decreased in 2013 by 11% from the levels recorded in 2012 – the first year on year drop since 2010 – but fraud remains […]
Retail Crime Survey
Most online retailers have suffered cyber attacks over the last year, the British Retail Consortium (BRC) suggests, while most fraud suffered by retailers also takes place online. The BRC’s British Retail Crime Survey 2013 found that 63% of online retailers said they had experienced hacking while 50% had faced denial of service attacks in 2012-13. […]
Mobile phone insurance fraud
Nine people had been charged with conspiracy to defraud after a UK-wide fraud to sell mobile phone insurance was uncovered. Four of those charged pleaded guilty last week at Swansea Crown Court and the jury were due to hear the prosecution’s opening of their case against the remaining defendants yesterday. Link to article