fraud

Identity thief nabbed with over 300,000 victim profiles

A California man was sentenced to eight years in prison for identity theft after federal police GPS-tracked his phone and discovered a hard drive with over 300,000 victim profiles during a raid of his home.

Robert Delgado, 40, who lived in a Los Angeles suburb called Monterey Park, pleaded guilty earlier this year to conspiracy to commit bank fraud and was sentenced on Monday. At the time of his arrest in March 2011, Delgado had already been on parole for identity theft.

Court documents show Delgado was accused of obtaining credit card numbers, forging credit cards and government-issued ID … Read more

E-voting machines vulnerable to remote vote changing

U.S. government researchers are warning that someone could sneak an inexpensive piece of electronics into e-voting machines like those to be used in the next national election and then remotely change votes after they have been cast.

The Vulnerability Assessment Team at Argonne Laboratory, which is a division of the Department of Energy, discovered this summer that Diebold touch-screen e-voting machines could be hijacked remotely, according to team leader Roger Johnston. Salon reported on it today, noting that as many as a quarter of American voters are expected to be using machines that are vulnerable to such attacks in … Read more

Full Tilt Poker a Ponzi scheme? Like Groupon?

I've been living in slight confusion lately, which has made it very hard to keep up with the hurtling sands of time.

So when I read moments ago that the U.S. Department of Justice had impounded the Full Tilt Poker Web site and accused the organization of being a "global Ponzi scheme," I thought that my mind had perhaps missed a day--or even a month.

I was sure that I'd been told very recently that it was social security that was a Ponzi scheme. How could social security have anything in common with poker played … Read more

Arrested UBS trader's anguished Facebook posts

You might have heard that UBS Bank recently lost $2 billion under what may well have been slightly fraudulent circumstances.

A 31-year-old man in a very fetching blue sweater, Kweku Adoboli, was arrested and charged with allegedly perpetrating this fraud through his trading activities as a bank employee.

He is now, therefore, referred to as a "rogue" trader. Although some might feel a more accurate description, should the accusations be proved, would be "trader whose nefarious activities got him into trouble where other traders get away with it."

Still, those for whom social networking is first … Read more

Researchers find avenues for fraud in Square

LAS VEGAS--Researchers at the Black Hat security conference today revealed two ways the Square payment system, which turns any iPhone, iPad or Android into a point-of-sale credit card processor, could be used for fraud.

Adam Laurie and Zac Franken, directors of Aperture Labs, discovered that they can transfer money from a stolen card into their bank account associated with Square without having to swipe a card through the Square dongle card reader. To do this, they used code written by Laurie that lets them feed magnetic stripe data from a stolen card into a microphone and convert it into a … Read more

FCC cracks down on unauthorized phone charges

The Federal Communications Commission approved a proposal today to give consumers the ability to better identify and complain about unauthorized charges on their phone bill.

The actions are part of the FCC's move to crack down on an illegal practice called "cramming," in which third parties will sneak in charges on phone bills for services that consumers haven't asked for and often don't know about.

"It's a serious and continuing problem for wireline customers, and an emerging problem for wireless customers as well," Chairman Julius Genachowski said on Tuesday during an FCC … Read more

Is this the end for red light cameras?

There seems to be a strange whiff of honesty swirling around the robot policemen known as red light cameras.

In different parts of the world, authorities are wondering whether there is any real benefit in having them at all. Yes, even financial benefit.

In the home of the automobile--no, not Detroit, Los Angeles--the Police Commission is, according to MSNBC, requesting that red light cameras should be removed before the Lakers and Clippers begin their new season.

You might wonder whether these objections are based on curiously moral grounds. Well, some objectors do, indeed, believe that red light cameras are merely … Read more

Scam Detector app saves you from getting ripped off

Sure, you know enough to steer clear of Nigerian princes (hopefully), but what about when the hotel desk calls your room because of a problem processing your credit card? Would you know better than to give the "receptionist" your number?

That's just one of the 350-plus scams exposed and explained in Scam Detector for iOS, an informative fraud database that can help you avoid getting ripped off.

The app doesn't "detect" scams so much as educate you about them. The data is divided into five categories: Auto, Face to Face, Internet, Telephone, and Travel. Within Internet you'll find five sub-categories: Social Networking, Financials, Employment Online, Houses & Properties, and Online Auctions & Tech.

In other words, it covers all the bases--and reveals a lot of scams I guarantee you've never heard of. For example, you know the guy standing in line behind you at the register, the one who looks like he's texting on his phone? He might actually be snapping photos, trying to get a readable shot of your credit card as it passes back and forth between you and the cashier.… Read more

This Day in Tech: Groupon IPO, Sony sites hacked, Twitter sex scandal

Too busy to keep up with the tech news? Here are some of the more interesting stories from CNET News for Thursday, June 2.

At D9, Windows 8 makes debut, and more (roundup) The gathering of tech CEOs and other bigwigs also puts the spotlight on Twitter's new photo-sharing service, Google's social-networking efforts, HP's WebOS ambitions, and then some. More

Zuckerberg calls Facebook contract a 'fraud' New York man's alleged contract and e-mails that supposedly give him 50 percent ownership of the social network are forgeries, new court filing from Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg claims. More… Read more

Weiner grapples with Twitter sex scandal

In the span of only a few days, Rep. Anthony Weiner has firmly ensnared himself in what is fast becoming Capitol Hill's first Twitter sex scandal of sorts.

What began with a photo of grey underwear revealing a certain distinctive outline has mushroomed into a full-fledged obsession among bloggers who have engaged in spirited bouts of digital forensics--and among political reporters who have, so far unsuccessfully, pressed the New York Democrat for specifics.

Weiner's Twitter account was used last weekend to address that rather intimate photo to Gennette Cordova, a 21-year-old college student in Seattle who says she … Read more