Category: Fight Back

August 28, 2019

How to Identify a Suspect Photo

If you receive a photo from someone on a dating website or a Facebook friend request or a scam email etc. you might want to know whether the photo is of the sender or has just been copied off the Internet.

Fake photos are a common problem on dating websites, where, for male scammers photos of uniformed soldiers are often used. For female scammers, the use of photos of random hot women stolen from social media sites is very common.

Google has a reverse image lookup facility and it’s easy to use.

Download a copy of the photo of the person on to your device if possible (or you can a URL pointing to the image)
Go to Google Image search and select the camera icon
Upload the photo or type in the URL for the image
The result will be a list showing where the picture is on the Internet.

This cannot be guaranteed to give 100% accurate results, but it makes a good effort to match the image you supply.

If the scammer has chosen a popular photo from a popular website then Google is likely to find it but if someone is just using a picture of their neighbour for example then there’s little chance of finding it.

Just because Google cannot find the photo on the Internet does not prove it is a genuine photo of the sender.

The scammers that use fake pictures may well work for professional criminal organisations and treat it like an everyday job. So, confronting them is pointless, trying to talk out of such deceitful behaviour is a waste of time.

If you catch people cheating with photos then report them to the social media site concerned or the relevant dating site.

You may also choose to report them to the Police and tell the scammer you know they are fake.

If you have any experiences with scammers, spammers or time-waster do let me know, by email.

August 16, 2019

Binary Options Trader in Court

Binary options is a form of stock market trading where essentially you are betting will go up or down rather than on how much it will move.

That sounds straightforward and maybe a 50:50 chance of winning but in fact 80% of people who try lose their money.

Lee Elbaz, the former chief executive of a major binary options company, goes on trial today in the US charged with defrauding clients of nearly $150m.

Her role in the fraud was first exposed with the help of a whistleblower, in November 2016, and some of the evidence presented by that insider has been used to prepare the case against Ms Elbaz.

The binary options scandal was a high-tech variant of boiler room scams. The fraudsters would cold call potential investors in other countries and persuade them to put money on whether a share or commodity price would go up or down. Initially the investor would see their money growing in an account held by the company and be encouraged to invest more — sometimes hundreds of thousands of pounds. However, when they tried to withdraw the money the binary options company would prevaricate and then stop taking their calls.

Billions of dollars was stolen from consumers all over the world, including the UK and US.

Ms Elbaz, also known as Lena Green, was the chief executive of Yukom, a company that operated binary options trading platforms under trade names such as BigOption and BinaryBook. Her team modelled themselves on Jordan Belfort — the New York stockbroker and scammer who inspired the film The Wolf of Wall Street. Ms Elbaz even took the team to see Belfort when he visited Israel.

The US government alleges that from around May 2014 through to around June 2017, Ms Elbaz directed a scheme to defraud binary options investors by lying to them and misleading them about the nature of binary options trading. Ms Elbaz, an Israeli citizen, was arrested when she flew to New York in September 2017.

Before the exposure of the fraud, binary options companies were allowed to openly advertise in the UK. One, Banc de Binary, sponsored Liverpool and Southampton football clubs. It was later forced to pay up $11 million in fines in the US before being wound up. The Israeli government banned such companies operating from Israel in October 2017 and in 2018 European governments barred the operators from selling to their citizens.

Good riddance.

If you have any experiences with binary options or similar scams – do let me know, by email.

July 26, 2019

The Romance Fraud Crusader

One year ago, Anna Rowe was a mother-of-two living in Rough Common working as a teaching assistant in a primary school.

Anna, was the victim of an online romance fraud known as a catfish scam and she lost her job at the primary school.

She had been duped by a high-flying London lawyer who misrepresented himself on dating app Tinder to engage with her and then start a passionate 14-month relationship.

Anna, who had been looking for love, thought she had met the man of her dreams. He turned out to be married and still living with his wife but had nevertheless managed to weave a complex web of lies and deceptions.

She decided she had to warn others and launched a campaign to outlaw catfishing, which is the name for someone who creates a fake persona to trap someone.

She believes It’s really important to do so because the effect on people can be devastating.

After Anna found out the truth of her lover’s identity, she wound up in counselling and her decision to go public cost her the job in Faversham.

The man who deceived her had initially used an image of Bollywood actor Saif Ali Khan as his profile picture before sending real ones to her. He called himself by a fake name, Antony Ray.

But when he stopped coming to see her, Anna needed to know why. With the help of a friend she discovered the awful truth and that she was not Antony’s only victim.

“He took advantage of my trust and took away my right to choose. Had I known, I would never have consented to a relationship with a married man, let alone a man who was actively having relations with multiple women simultaneously”.

“His behaviour was premeditated, yet the current law will not find his actions a criminal offence. That’s why I’m calling for creating fake profiles for the intent to use people for sex to be a crime.”

Anna has since spoken to politicians and police officers.

Her petition has received 43,500 signatures so far and has prompted a government Green Paper into catfish scams.

Anna’s story has been told around the globe. She has made TV and radio appearances and is determined to keep pressing on with the campaign.

Anna’s website is at https://catchthecatfish.com/

Good luck with your campaign, Anna

If you have any experiences with scammers, spammers or time-waster do let me know, by email.

July 19, 2019

Home Insulation Fraudster Jailed

Home insulation fraudster Adam Roberts targeted pensioners to fund his extravagant lifestyle, which included a £90,000 Aston Martin and a Rolex watch.

Adam Roberts ran a fraudulent business selling home insulation to pensioners at hugely inflated prices and has now been jailed for three years.

He charged pensioners in Surrey , Hampshire, Dorset and Devon ludicrous prices for home insulation while falsely claiming it would save them money on their council tax and energy bills.

In many cases, victims had recently had their homes insulated under a government scheme, meaning the work was also unnecessary.

Judge Rufus Talyor said: “It seems clear to me that there was an effort to target the elderly and vulnerable,” mentioning the victims were all aged 65 or older and some had serious health problems including blindness and memory difficulties.

Adam Roberts’ business Eco Energy Advice Ltd (EEA), traded for just one year between 2015 and 2016, making £1.5 million, although not all of its income was the result of misleading sales techniques.

During that time, Roberts described himself as the CEO or “the King”, despite being subject to a bankruptcy order prohibiting him from operating a business. He circumvented this order by having his sister, Laura Oxley, act as EEA’s only named director.

Judge Taylor said EEA had operated “almost like a boiler room”, with numerous telesales agents cold calling pensioners and saying “almost anything to get someone through the door”.

Field sales agents would then visit customers to sign them up to the scheme, telling them their insulation was dangerous or out of date, even when perfectly serviceable, and promising fictitious discounts or council tax rebates to pressure them into signing up.

A reputable company will never ask you to agree straight away to work. If you have been subjected to heavy handed sales resulting in undue pressure or unfair pricing, then do report them to Trading Standards.

If you have any experiences with this kind of scammer, do let me know, by email.

July 12, 2019

Fightback Nan

The Daily Scam is a great web site run by three guys in America who became sick of the flood of scam emails, texts and phone calls that invade our lives.

One lady who contacted them (they call her Nan) tells of her attempts to waste the scammers time and hand the scammers details over to the Police. This is one of her exploits (reproduced with permission from The Daily Scam).

Nan was burned once by a scammer last year and she is once burned, twice shy. Nan now prides herself as a scam-hunter and we’re proud of her! Rather than cancel her accounts through which she has been targeted by scammers, Nan lies in wait, excited when she recognizes the tell-tale signs of a scam. She’s learned the hard way and now puts that knowledge to good use. Nan has been contacted several times through her Care.com account by what she has come to recognize as the advance check scam. Advance-check scams are very common and Nan tells us that the scammers can bring it on.

Email To: Nan from “James Abott / Ato Jina”

Hi, You will receive the Assignment Package today. Kindly follow the instruction letter enclosed and complete the Assignment immediately. I will be looking forward to hear from you. Please reply

Nan received a United States Postal Service 2-day priority mail envelope from a business identified as Moving Right Along, located in Fort Lauderdale, FL. There is a real business with this name and address but not in Florida. It is located in Ozone Park, New York!

The envelope that “ato jino” sent to Nan contained the following instructions on stationary from “Clear Lake Regional Medical Center.”

Dear Sir/Madam,

This is the First Assignment Package as discussed in our previous conversation.

*You will have to cash/deposit the cashier’s check ($1646.71) at your bank today

*The funds should be available in your bank account same day or next day [THIS IS A LIE! MOST BANKS REQUIRE 3-7 DAYS, depending on several factors including if a deposit is made on a weekend or holiday, and make take 5-7 days before determining that a check is fraudulent.]

*Deduct $350 as your weekly wages and another $100 for Moneygram sending fee and Gas

To send the remaining funds $1196) to the Hospital Cashier that would be taking care of the Medication of the Client.

Below is the information of the Company Cashier:

Name: Felix Starks / Address: 3500 Hemphill St, City: Fort Worth State: Texas

Zip Code: 76110…………………………Please send $1196 here via MONEYGRAM

*Kindly send the eight digits Moneygram Reference Number of the transaction above after the transaction has been completed to my e-mail [email protected]

Yours sincerely
Dr. James Abbott

From: Nan
Date: Jan 5, 2017 12:52 PM
Subject: Re: Hi
To: “ato jino” <[email protected]>

OK I’ve reported you to the authorities.. thanks for another scam!! I’ve already now turned in 10 people! You will be caught for what you are doing. You are a criminal and shame on you!!

Nan says that she has played the scammers several times now. As she has told us… “I love catching these scam artists in the act. It’s literally a high because I’m stopping them from scamming innocent people. Just being able to help is amazing to me.”

What did Nan accomplish? A lot actually. She wasted the scammer’s time and money, and put him at risk by exposing the fraud. By informing the bank and the authorities, she made it much harder to use the bogus checks pretending to be this bank. But most importantly, she played them much like the way they play others. And so, to Nan, we say thank you! You are truly a crusader and we salute you

For more details on Nan’s scambaiting go to www.thedailyscam.com/anti-scam-crusader/

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July 5, 2019

Neighbourhood Watch Week

The week commencing 17^th June was Neighbourhood Watch week.

It was a reason to look at the great work done to protect communities by the Neighbourhood teams across the country.

You’ll find Neighbourhood Watch online at www.ourwatch.org.uk

They claim to be the largest crime prevention movement in England and Wales with 2.3 million member households and their mission is to bring neighbours together to create strong, friendly, active communities where crime and anti-social behaviour are less likely to happen.

There are numerous examples on their website of the great work being done, such as the one below.

Pocket Park

There was a disused lay-by that had attracted drug dealing and fly-tipping and the idea was to turn it into a pocket park. At the same time, a campaign was in progress to turn a disused shop front into a Window Gallery. The two projects were to help create a more vibrant, safe and connected community.

The team kept pressure on the local council by emailing and holding regular meetings with various councillors and community groups. They attended ward panel meetings with police, councillors and other groups locally in the belief that if they kept the pressure on they could eventually effect change.

It took six years for the pocket park and 18 months for the Window Gallery.

They took pictures regularly of the degradation and vandalism and shared these with the council. Every time a crime occurred in the lay-by they ensured it was reported and reported any fly tipping etc.

They created social media groups to keep momentum and team spirits up.

The council funded the creation of the pocket park with agreements from residents to lightly maintain it – picking litter, weeding and watering it regularly.

For the gallery, they applied for funding and approached local businesses. They gained funding from several streams including the heritage lottery fund, the St James Big Local community group and a local estate agent.

Well done the local Neighbourhood Watch team of volunteers.

If you have any experiences with Neighbourhood Watch do let me know, by email.