NoTeaPartyPleez
Gold Member
- Dec 2, 2012
- 11,826
- 1,912
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I've been on the phone most of the day with a very close friend who woke up this morning to find out that the only money he had was a couple of thousand dollars he kept in his basement. Overnight his identity was stolen.
This morning the phone began to ring with calls from his banks and credit card companies telling him of suspicious activities. He logged on to accounts online and saw either red or zero.
This is what he wrote in his email to me:
The bad news keeps going from bad to worse. Im heading to the bank in a few moments to file a dispute. Theres no guarantee. Insurance like FDIC is to protect your account if the bank fails. Fraud is a little trickier. All the bank accounts were drained and the overdraft protection exhausted.
Every other account where I had money or investments is just zeroed out. The money wasnt used to buy anything. The assets werent sold. Its like it never existed. Ive already spoken to the FBI and the SEC. They indicated the prognosis isnt good when this happens. From what I can determine so far, my credit lines have also been maxed out into the 6-figures. So far I dont see any silver lining. I fear this nightmare is just beginning.
This person is not a careless, clueless low-info idiot. On the contrary, he's an Ivy League educated lawyer with a lot of money, so therefore the perfect target.
The best we can assess at this early stage is his SS number and other identifiers were sold on a black website. The buyers quickly pay a fee, probably through PayPal, and then hit his accounts with all kinds of front merchant accounts from overseas. He lost over $100K in cash in just minutes. Charges from Colombia to Vermont, from Belgium to Hawaii are logged on reams of print outs.
I have no idea how to protect myself from this, but I just wanted to post this and alert others. Contact your bank and ask them how they handle such situations and see if they have restitution after establishing fraud. Do something. This is rampant. 12,000,000 identity thefts alone in 2011.
This morning the phone began to ring with calls from his banks and credit card companies telling him of suspicious activities. He logged on to accounts online and saw either red or zero.
This is what he wrote in his email to me:
The bad news keeps going from bad to worse. Im heading to the bank in a few moments to file a dispute. Theres no guarantee. Insurance like FDIC is to protect your account if the bank fails. Fraud is a little trickier. All the bank accounts were drained and the overdraft protection exhausted.
Every other account where I had money or investments is just zeroed out. The money wasnt used to buy anything. The assets werent sold. Its like it never existed. Ive already spoken to the FBI and the SEC. They indicated the prognosis isnt good when this happens. From what I can determine so far, my credit lines have also been maxed out into the 6-figures. So far I dont see any silver lining. I fear this nightmare is just beginning.
This person is not a careless, clueless low-info idiot. On the contrary, he's an Ivy League educated lawyer with a lot of money, so therefore the perfect target.
The best we can assess at this early stage is his SS number and other identifiers were sold on a black website. The buyers quickly pay a fee, probably through PayPal, and then hit his accounts with all kinds of front merchant accounts from overseas. He lost over $100K in cash in just minutes. Charges from Colombia to Vermont, from Belgium to Hawaii are logged on reams of print outs.
I have no idea how to protect myself from this, but I just wanted to post this and alert others. Contact your bank and ask them how they handle such situations and see if they have restitution after establishing fraud. Do something. This is rampant. 12,000,000 identity thefts alone in 2011.
