A massive chunk of all US banking customers have recently experienced some type of fraud on their accounts, according to a new study. Consumer insights and analytics firm J.D. Power says the study shows 29% of US bank customers and 22% of credit card users – at banks like Wells Fargo, Bank of America and […]
The post Nearly One-Third of All Customers at US Banks Have Experienced Fraud in Last 12 Months: Study appeared first on The Daily Hodl.
An elderly parent is reportedly devastated after scammers contacted him via email masquerading as his own daughter. Françoise Schorosch says the criminals said all the right things to her father online, perfectly mimicking the way she writes partially in German and partially in English, The Guardian reports. The style of scam has been dubbed the […]
The post Thousands Drained From Elderly Man’s Bank Account in Sophisticated ‘Hi Dad’ Email Scheme As Lender Remains Silent: Report appeared first on The Daily Hodl.
Artificial intelligence is fueling billions of dollars in losses to scams as criminals clone people’s voices to compromise credit cards and bank accounts. The classic scam where victims receive a call from a loved one asking for money is far easier with AI, WBTV reports. Cybersecurity expert Thomas Hyslip, who spent two decades in federal […]
The post Scammers Using AI to Clone Voices, Drain Bank Accounts As Deloitte Forecasts $30,000,000,000 in AI Losses by 2027 appeared first on The Daily Hodl.
Lloyds Bank says tens of thousands of customers in the UK are falling for fake websites while shopping. The bank says credit and debit card customers have been fooled into buying items that never arrive, pouring a total of $8 million (£6 million) into the hands of scammers in the last year alone, reports Yahoo […]
The post Banking Giant Says Tens of Thousands of Customers Are Spending Millions on Products That Never Arrive: Report appeared first on The Daily Hodl.
The U.S. DOJ has charged the CFO of a media company with one count of money laundering and two counts of bank fraud for participating in a scheme that laundered criminal proceeds using cryptocurrency. Authorities allege that Weidong Guan and his accomplices used bank accounts opened with stolen personal identification information to transfer the funds […]
United States Attorney Damian Williams says the lies of the former Minnesota Vikings co-owner exposed the U.S. financial system to “serious risk.”
Reginald Fowler, a former NFL team owner, has been sentenced to six years of prison for operating as a “shadow bank” to the crypto sector, which involved over $700 million in unregulated transactions over a 10-month timespan in 2018.
The 63-year-old, who was a co-owner of the Minnesota Vikings, was sentenced to a total of 75 months on bank fraud and money laundering charges, according to a statement from the United States Attorney’s Office in New York on June 5.
Former co-owner of Minnesota Vikings sentenced to 75 months in prison for providing shadow banking services to cryptocurrency exchangeshttps://t.co/Nc2PVhEajw
— US Attorney SDNY (@SDNYnews) June 5, 2023
It marks the end of a five-year long case that began when he was arrested in 2019 for alleged shadow banking. Shadow banking is a term used to describe (often illegal) bank-like activities that are carried out by non-bank entities.
Fowler initially pleaded not guilty to all charges in 2020, but changed his plea to guilty in April 2022.
In his latest statement, U.S. Attorney Damian Williams said that a string of lies enabled Fowler to mislead and deceive several banks:
“Reginald Fowler evaded federal law by processing hundreds of millions of dollars of unregulated transactions on behalf of cryptocurrency exchanges as a shadow bank. He did so by lying to legitimate U.S. financial institutions, which exposed the U.S. financial system to serious risk.”
Williams then said Fowler “victimized” the Alliance of American Football (AAF) — a former professional football league — by lying about his net worth in order to own a “substantial” stake in the league.
“Let it be clear: this Office is committed to prosecuting people who lie to banks and skirt the law as a means to conduct their business,” the federal prosecutor stressed.
According to Williams, Fowler managed to pull off his crimes by establishing Global Trading Solutions (GTS) around February 2018, which worked with Crypto Capital and other crypto firms operating out of Israel.
There, Fowler, GTS and the crypto firms sidestepped a license by lying to banks in order to open accounts that were used to process crypto transactions.
OK -now at crypto Fowler sentencing. It was set for 10: FOwler just came in at 10:19 am. Inner City Press is covering the case https://t.co/S97h82I3FP and will live tweet, thread below pic.twitter.com/HapbKHoHaz
— Inner City Press (@innercitypress) June 5, 2023
Fowler opened a dozen of these accounts to facilitate these crypto transactions without the banks’ knowledge and failed to disclose GTS’s relationship with the crypto firms, Williams said:
“At no point were FOWLER, GTS, nor any of the Crypto Companies ever licensed as a money transmitting business in the United States, as required by federal law.”
Related: Cryptocurrency has become a playground for fraudsters
One of the crypto firms involved was iFinex Inc — the parent company of crypto exchange Bitfinex and stablecoin issuer Tether, it claimed.
Other convictions included bank fraud conspiracy, operation of an unlicensed money-transmitting business, conspiracy to operate an unlicensed money-transmitting business, and wire fraud.
In addition to the prison sentence, Fowler was ordered to forfeit $740 million and pay over $53 million in restitution to the AAF.
Magazine: Unstablecoins: Depegging, bank runs and other risks loom
According to two sources close to FTX, Sam Bankman-Fried, the disgraced co-founder, gave his father, Stanford Law professor Joseph Bankman, millions of dollars. The funds are reportedly being used to pay for legal costs. The sources said that Bankman-Fried allegedly gave “at least $10 million” from the now-defunct quantitative trading firm Alameda Research to his […]
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