Before leaving the country, Fermin left his Blackberry on his table along with some junk mail. His mother came over while he was gone to clean up, and swept up the phone along with the junk mail and tossed it. Someone found it in the garbage and used it to make $6,000 in fraudulent calls. Fermin negotiated with T-Mobile to pay $2,000, then they changed their minds without notice and decide to hold him on the hook for $4,000. What’s a consumer to do? [More]
fraud
Do Not Buy Insurance Called 'ObamaCare'
By 8.30.10
Con artists went door-to-door in California selling senior citizens fake health care policies called “ObamaCare,” threatening that they’d have to go to jail unless they paid up. The unfortunate marks fell victim to a con, unaware that the actual jail-threatening ObamaCare peddlers will be wearing official Star Wars stormtrooper uniforms and won’t be hitting the streets until well after the midterm elections. [More]
Thieves Steal $10 Million, Pennies At A Time
By 8.27.10
These credit card thieves allegedly stole over $10 million by placing bogus charges on customers’ credit cards for amounts between $10 and $.20. Each customer was stolen from only once, spreading the theft out over a million different cardholders. Check your statements, there’s a decent chance you were one of them. [More]
Penis Pump Medicare Billing Fraud Scheme Deflated
By 8.25.10
Several Miami businessman were indicted for fraudulently billing Medicare for penis pumps. In one instance, the company billed Medicare for four different penis pumps for one female patient. “That,” said a Medicare spokesman, “we should have caught.” [More]
Why Is Dish Network Billing Me For Someone Else's Account?
By 8.20.10
Liza tells Consumerist that she signed up for Dish Network about a month ago, but ultimately didn’t keep the service because she couldn’t get reception. She still got the privilege of paying for the service, though, since someone put her billing information down for a different customer’s account. [More]
Notorious Alleged Stolen Credit Card Data Reseller Arrested, But His Promo Cartoon Remains
By 8.12.10
An alleged big-time old-school credit card data reseller was arrested in France and extradited to America after Department of Justice investigators arranged to buy some credit card data off him via ICQ. His reign as king jerk may have ended, but the flash cartoon he used to promote his netherworldly services is still online (NSFW). [More]
Crooks Crack Check Image Sites, Steal $9 Million
By 8.2.10
Know how when you go into your online checking account you can click on checks that you’ve written and see the scanned image of them? Well, those pictures have to be stored somewhere, and they’re not always secure. Russian crooks broke into three sites that store archival check images, stole the information, and wrote over $9 million in phony checks against over 1,200 accounts. [More]
Auto Dealers And Fake Foreclosure Relief Offers Top Consumer Complaints For Last Year
By 7.28.10
The 2009 Consumer Complaint Survey Report is out, and it says that among the 18 states that participated in the survey, complaints about auto dealers topped the list for the second year in a row. However, the fastest-growing category of complaints were about fake foreclosure relief offers. [More]
Apple Sued Because iPad Does Not Work "Just Like A Book" As Claimed
By 7.28.10
A new class action suit filed in California takes issue with how the iPad shuts off automatically if it overheats. In particular, however, the suit claims that the marketing phrase “reading on the iPad is just like reading a book” is misleading, and that Apple is therefore engaging in fraud and misleading consumers. This is great news for me, because I was thinking of suing Apple for not providing dustjackets for iBookstore titles but my friends told me I shouldn’t. [More]
Don't Give Greyhound Tickets As Gifts
By 7.27.10
If you buy a Greyhound bus ticket for someone else, Greyhound will charge you a flat $18 “gift ticket fee,” which must be the worst named fee in the history of transportation. On short rides, like a one-way trip from Cambridge, MA to Hartford, CT, it bumps the price up from $22 to $40. [More]
Watch A Money Mule Scam Unfold
By 7.14.10
This gal was looking to make ends meet by doing finding a part-time work-at-home gig, and ended up getting accused of committing felony fraud. [More]
Wiring Money Is A Ripoff Red Flag
By 7.13.10
One good way to get ripped off in a transaction is to agree to wire the other person money. Whether it’s through your bank, money order, or Western Union, wiring money has zero protections against loss. Which is why con artists love it dearly. [More]
I Canceled FedEx Shipment To Scammer, FedEx Still Delivered Package
By 7.12.10
When Randall found out the guy to whom he sold an expensive digital camera was a con artist who skipped payment, he had already shipped out the product. He hurriedly called FedEx to stop the shipment and was assured he’d get the package back, but wires were crossed and the conman got the camera. [More]
Hackers Love Stealing Your Credit Card From Hotels
By 7.6.10
Make sure you check your credit card for suspicious charges after you use it at a hotel. A new study finds that 38% of credit card hacking cases involved hotels, way ahead of any other industry. [More]
Watch Out For Too-Good-To-Be-True Car Deals Online
By 7.2.10
The Better Busines Bureau warns against flim-flam folks who pretend to sell cars, posing with websites with syntax close to the names of reputable dealers. These guys aim to take you for a ride all right. [More]
Reader Nearly Gets Jacked By Fake ATM
By 6.29.10
Reader Paul was trying to enjoy fried pop tarts at an outdoor city festival in his hometown when his debit card was nearly stolen by a fake ATM. Someone had modified an arcade cabinet and placed it outside a bank where it had captured the overflow traffic spilling out of the bank lobby. [More]
Watch Out For Tiny Fraudulent Charges On Your Accounts
By 6.28.10
The new hot fraud these days involves something that kinda sounds like it belongs in Superman III, but is new and different. Scamsters make tiny charges to tons and tons of accounts, hoping that the account holders won’t notice a charge for less than $10. And often they don’t. [More]
To Catch A Ponzi Schemer
By 6.25.10
There’s a cool article over at Bay Citizen that gives a play-by-play account of a private investigator’s efforts to tail a suspected Bay Area ponzi scheme master. What makes it all the more interesting is that the target, an ex-con and fugitive, had developed an arsenal of tactics he used used to try to evade anyone who might be tracking him. [More]
