Between 2005 and 2011, the Coalition Against Breast Cancer raised around $10 million in donations intended for research to combat the disease, but authorities say that no such research ever occurred, and all that money went to pay for a grand total of 40 mammograms in seven years. [More]
Remember when we told you about the scammers out to trick people into thinking they’d won travel vouchers from the nonexistent (at least in the U.S.) United Airways? Since then we’ve heard of two apparently separate-but-similar scams using the Travelocity name to deceive unsuspecting consumers. [More]
More than 1-in-10 American adults fall victim to some sort of fraud, according to a new report from the Federal Trade Commission. And scams related to fraudulent weight-loss products are by far the most prevalent. [More]
For at least the last year, something calling itself ‘United Airways’ — which is the name of a regional carrier in Asia that has nothing to do with this story — has been sending out versions of the above letter to consumers, promising free reward travel, but both the airline industry and the Better Business Bureau say it’s nothing but a scam. [More]
It’s bad enough to call up an elderly person and mislead him or her into paying a pile of cash for a medical alert service they don’t need or want. But what takes one Brooklyn-based telemarketing scheme to the next level was its alleged tendency to bill consumers thousands of dollars for something they never ordered. [More]
With all the news of scammers out there stealing money from unsuspecting folks using the lowdown, dirty “Help, I’m your grandson/niece/other close family relative!” act, our hearts are warmed all the more when observant customer associates stop those scams cold. Here to brighten the day comes the tale of the Walmart employee and the loving grandma. [More]
Even though it’s nothing new, we’ve recently started seeing a resurgence of reader e-mails asking if a really awesome-sounding rental listing on Craigslist might be a scam, so we figured it was time for a refresher course. [More]
Lest you think that the only people being taken in by apparently obvious scams are naive rubes, it looks like lots of people with fancy law degrees are being scammed by letting their avarice get the better of them. [More]
While the Federal Trade Commission is working to protect American consumers from scam artists, badvertisers, robocallers, and other unseemly types, the agency is not handing out $250,000 sweepstakes prizes. [More]
We recently told you about scammers tricking consumers into sharing sensitive information by telling them a federal stimulus plan will pay their power bill for a month; they just need your SSN and bank routing number. If you think that no one would fall for such an obvious ruse, then you might be surprised to know that not only were thousands of people in New Jersey taken in by the scam, but they passed it along to their friends because they thought it was a good deal. [More]
It’s barely been two weeks since the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the most controversial portion of the Affordable Care Act, and scammers have already been busy on the phone trying to steal folks’ money by pretending they work for the government and need your sensitive, personal information. [More]
Software crashes. And sometimes when it does, you get the option of sending an error report to the developer. You’ll never hear back, because that’s not the purpose of the report. But that hasn’t stopped scammers from pretending they are Microsoft techs responding to your crash reports. [More]
Have you ever answered a call from an unfamiliar number only to hear a recording tell you there is important information about your automobile warranty? You’re not alone, as the folks at the FTC have shut down an operation it says was responsible for billions of instances of deceptive dialing. [More]
If you live in an area hit hard by the collapse of the housing market, you might have received a letter from a company promising that if you join other struggling homeowners in filing lawsuits against your lender, you can get mortgage relief, a cash reward and maybe even the title to your home. What it doesn’t mention is that you could end up being scammed out of thousands of dollars. [More]
Here’s a helpful hint to anyone wishing to run a million-dollar insurance scam — don’t post pictures on Facebook of you and your friends waving wads of cash. [More]
As people have gotten wiser to the obvious hallmarks of online scams, the scammers have had to step up their game in order to keep making a dishonest buck. And now that people begin thinking about their upcoming summer vacation rentals, these scammers are prepared with the latest in darned-close-to-realistic-but-still-fake realty listings. [More]
Yesterday, we discussed the fun that could be had at Costco with a fake shopping list. Today’s story involves a fake check that looks like it comes from Costco but is just a variation on a classic scam. [More]
Armed with only an illegal cellphone and a cadre of secret shoppers, an inmate at the nation’s largest single federal prison was able to coordinate upwards of $1 million in credit card fraud in the outside world. [More]
