Fraud Tips

Ongoing problems with scams being run on Facebook -- including one that pretended be to from a state legislator -- has led to an inquiry by Connecticut's attorney general about how the social networking giant is dealing with fraud on its pages.

Just days after Consumer Ally reported that a U.S. National Guard general's identity was used in a Facebook and Skype scam, Connecticut State Rep. Kim Rose, (D-Milford), found a phony page that purported to be hers. It had already been operating for what state officials think was "a matter of weeks" -- fraudsters set up a fake Facebook account with her name and picture, and used it to fool supporters into giving them money.

A Romanian con artist who helped defraud consumers with fake listings on sites like eBay and Craigslist pleaded guilty before a U.S. District Judge to one count each of wire fraud and conspiracy for his role in transferring and hiding the proceeds of an international crime ring.

Adrian Ghighina, a native of Bucharest, the Romanian capital, was indicted by a federal grand jury in the Northern District of Illinois in April 2008 on seven counts of wire fraud. In May 2010, Ghighina was also indicted by a federal grand jury in Washington on charges of conspiracy, bank fraud and money laundering.

The founder of two charities that were supposed to help veterans is accused of pocketing $690,000 in donations and improperly using money given to the charities to make unreported political contributions.

The lawsuit was filed by the Oregon Attorney General's office against Gregory Warnock and groups he founded: the Oregon War Veterans Association and Military Family Support Foundation.

Investors swindled in a DVD rental machine scam will be refunded more than $3 million by the Federal Trade Commission, which has been pursuing its case against the defendants behind the scheme for several years.

The FTC's law enforcement action against American Entertainment Distributors, Inc., was filed in 2005 and named 10 defendants. The U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida has entered final orders against nine of them, assessing fines to refund their victims.

National Guard Maj. Gen. Michael D. Dubie's name and photos have turned up as part of an Internet scam that bilked a Toronto woman of $3,000, prompting a multi-agency investigation to track down the perpetrators.

The Facebook page of the real Major General Michael D. Dubie warns visitors that someone is using his name and photos in an Internet scam.

The Vermont general, a 32-year veteran of the National Guard and a retired commercial airline pilot, has commanded the 447th Air Expeditionary Group in Baghdad, Iraq, and has logged more than 2,000 hours at the controls of aircraft like the F-16, but he has never experienced computerized identity theft, until now.

Nearly 12,000 consumers defrauded by a massive auto warranty robocaller scheme have been mailed claim forms by the Federal Trade Commission to obtain refunds.

The robocaller, VoiceTouch Inc., working with other scammers, swindled 11,780 victims via illegal robocalls on behalf of Transcontinental Warranty, Inc., which sold the bogus auto warranties. Trancontinental hired Voice Touch to bombard consumers with millions of deceptive pre-recorded calls in 2009.

The recent fleecing of a Consumer Ally reader by a bogus online lender underscores a basic rule of the road when trying to avoid getting scammed: Never, ever wire money to someone you don't know.

The victim, whom we'll call Miranda due to her wish to remain anonymous, learned that painful lesson when she fell for an advance-fee loan scam, an old and effective con that tricks victims into paying an upfront premium for a loan that never materializes. The Federal Trade Commission recently banned debt-relief telemarketers from charging advance fees for loans.

Scammers on Facebook rapidly capitalized on a video supposedly showing a CBS Los Angeles TV reporter having an on-air stroke after the Grammy Awards telecast, using readers' curiosity to push out a piece of badware.

Serene Branson created a flurry of web activity on Monday when, during a post-awards report, she had a problem forming words and appeared to be suffering from a seizure or stroke. Since then, she is reportedly resting in good condition after being checked by paramedics and told her bosses the on-air incident had nothing to do with medical problems.

After the footage went viral, scammers have capitalized on continued interest in the video, posting on social networking site Facebook messages with the heading "Reporter Had a Stroke on Live TV" that contain some variation of the words: "Omg this reporter had a stroke on live tv check it out [LINK]."

With school vacations approaching, consumers are being warned to watch out for an expected increase in scams linked to school vacation weeks this month and next.

Scam vacation agents want to take advantage of your wintertime blues, targeting would-be travelers with promises of deep-discount getaways and free trips, but these often-phony offers only result in vanished first payments and the harvesting of personal information.