Monday, November 08, 2021

Craig Wright - Baker Fraud Report

 Today is the fifth day of the civil trial between Craig Wright, chief scientist of crypto research firm nChain, and the estate of Dave Kleiman, Wright’s collaborator and business partner in the early days of Bitcoin. For newcomers to crypto, the name Craig Wright might not mean much, and fair enough: He is a largely discredited figure at the very margins of the industry, most likely these days to surface in as an object of bemusementIn Craig Wright Trial, Plaintiffs Lay Out Pattern of Fraud, Deceit and Hubris




Craig Wright claims he’s received keys to ‘Satoshi’ Bitcoin stash worth $8.6B


The home and offices of the mysterious person believed to be the founder of Bitcoin have been raided by Australian police.

Nearly a dozen police officers were spotted entering the Sydney home belonging to 44-year-old Craig Steven Wright on Wednesday, The Guardian reported.

Craig Wright’s Latest Funhouse-Mirror Legal Adventure The whole thing has the bizarre air of a snake eating its own tail, except neither the snake nor the tail actually exist.



"Suspected foreign hackers have breached nine organizations in the defense, energy, health care, technology and education sectors," reports CNN, citing their exclusive glimpse at findings from security firm Palo Alto Networks

CNN: Foreign Hackers Breached Nine Organizations to Steal 'Key Data' from 'Sensitive Targets'


The DarkSide ransomware gang spent a year or so as one of the most prolific groups in a very crowded field of criminal hackers, culminating in an attack on the Colonial Pipeline that caused a temporary gas shortage along the East Coast. They went dark not long after that, presumably because of all the attention, but likely reemerged as a group that called themselves BlackMatter not long after. Now, the US State Department has offered a reward of up to $10 million for anyone who has information that will help them identify or locate DarkSide leadership, as well as up to $5 million for tips that lead to the arrest or conviction of DarkSide affiliates. There's no easy answer for ransomware, but putting pressure on its most high-profile perpetrators is at least a start.

The US Puts a $10M Bounty on DarkSide Ransomware Hackers


LAW ENFORCEMENT USE of surveillance drones has proliferated across the United States in recent years, sparking backlash from privacy advocates. But newly leaked aerial surveillance footage from the Dallas Police Department in Texas and what appears to be Georgia's State Patrol underscore the breadth and sophistication of footage captured by another type of aerial police vehicle: helicopters.

The transparency activist group Distributed Denial of Secrets, or DDoSecrets, posted a 1.8-terabyte trove of police helicopter footage to its website on Friday. DDoSecrets cofounder Emma Best says that her group doesn’t know the identity of the source who shared the data and that no affiliation or motivation for leaking the files was given. The source simply said that the two police departments were storing the data in unsecured cloud infrastructure.


1.8 TB of Police Helicopter Surveillance Footage Leaks Online



Europol announces concentrated effort against 12 major ransomware scammers; actions in Ukraine and Switzerland 
 
FTC issues new policy statement on free trial offers/subscription traps that spells out needed disclosures;  Statement itself here;
One Commissoner dissents because of pending rulemaking on this subject
 
National Consumers League warns scammers are expected to take advantage of supply chain issues to scam victims over the Christmas holidays
 
Article by DOJ on how they address money mules issues
 
Thought of the week: Now that scammers have earned millions (maybe billions) from applying online for unemployment benefits they are very likely to replicate that by using ID theft to steal other kinds of government benefits.  See the article on Calgary police arresting scammers who applied for student loans online using stolen identities.
 
BBB Studies. Here are links to the study topics: puppy fraudromance fraudBEC fraudsweepstakes/lottery fraud,  tech support fraudromance fraud money mulescrooked moversgovernment impostersonline vehicle sale scamsrental fraudgift cards and job scams.
 
Coronavirus 

Fraud News Around the world

Humor 

FTC and CFPB  

Virus Benefit Theft

Social media

Business Email compromise fraud 

Ransomware  

IRS and tax frauds 

ATM skimming

Romance Fraud and Sextortion