Who’s Behind the ‘Web Listings’ Mail Scam?
krebsonsecurity.com
krebsonsecurity.com
The fact is, most scams operate this way. There are generally subtle signs that it's a scam if you look hard enough AND know what to look for, but they are effective because they are misleading and rely on some realities of human nature, such as the fact that many people trust that when they receive something that looks like a bill, it's actually a bill, and they will often pay it without looking it over with a fine-toothed comb.
Claiming that it's not a scam, even though it's clearly deceptive, just because an astute person might be able to identify it as a scam by reading the fine print, is unfair to those who are taken in. It's like trying to pass off counterfeit bills and then claiming you weren't engaging in fraud because the money had "Not legal tender" written in small print and the store clerk would have realized that if they'd only inspected every individual bill closely enough.
This scam is also not a "stupid tax." Its victims do not deserve to be defrauded simply because they failed to exercise the same caution that a more savvy person might have. It is an immoral, legally gray activity that hurts others and tends to prey on vulnerable people, like the elderly and those for whom English is not a first language.
> Matter otherwise legally acceptable in the mails which— is in the form of, and reasonably could be interpreted or construed as, a bill, invoice, or statement of account due; but constitutes, in fact, a solicitation for the order by the addressee of goods or services, or both; is nonmailable matter [...] unless such matter bears on its face, in conspicuous and legible type in contrast by typography, layout, or color with other printing on its face [...] the following notice: [...]
(emphasis added).
The law says that this wiggle room does not exist directly in the text. It's a scam, and clearly so.
As discussed at length in the excellent book "Lying for Money" by Dan Davies, these kinds of scam exploit the trust that exists in the business world and perhaps most destructive in the way that they destroy that trust. Having to spend extra time verifying the provenance every invoice or bill you receive is the kind of thing that, in aggregate, becomes a huge cost and irritation.
Victims don't deserve to get scammed, but that doesn't mean they shouldn't exercise caution.
Why is tricking people legally ok?
In chapter one, Ken explains why this is absolutely fraud:
> Whether a communication is fraudulent — for the purposes of criminal law, torts, or consumer protection law — depends upon communications as a whole. Scammers cannot insulate themselves with fine print, hidden disclosures, or contradictory disclaimers when the entire solicitation is intended to defraud and is misleading to a reasonable person.
Although the mailing in OP is somewhat less scammy, on the totality of the evidence, any reasonable person would clearly decide that it is mail fraud.
Are state run lotteries also a scam given how they are advertised in a way to exploit underlying flaws in human rationality?
Are the people who go on dating applications with the primary goal of seeking free meals from their dates scam artists?
Are advertisers making any sort of ad that exploits underlying flaws in human nature scamming their users, but not quite to the level of this flyer, scam artists?
What about grocery stores who put the products that appeal to children at heights meant for the children to see them, and who do things like put candy at the checkout section?
What about every phone vendor, game vendor, and website that has a large legal document that they know full well their users aren't reading, but requiring them to agree to, as they know the users will just click the I agree and move on?
All of these are in some way exploiting flaws in humans to make a profit. Should they all be scams and condemned? Maybe so, but we should try to be consistent in doing so.
>It's like trying to pass off counterfeit bills and then claiming you weren't engaging in fraud because the money had "Not legal tender" written in small print and the store clerk would have realized that if they'd only inspected every individual bill closely enough.
So, what would be the closest thing to legal tender that a person can offer to use without payment without having to explicitly call out the fact it isn't legal payment? If I were to offer someone operating a register an item of value, let's say an older model smartphone, in place of my bill, wouldn't that be legal and wouldn't it be acceptable for them to accept that as trade for the items? If they aren't an owner and don't have permission to make such decisions, then they should either refuse or act as a middle man (accept the item and pay out of their own product, if that is allowed). But how close can I get to legal tender before it becomes unacceptable socially and unacceptable legally? Does either answer maybe depend upon how I look, if I'm attractive, what gender/race I am, how rich I am? I ask that because I do honestly think if we had alien scientists who were creating a perfect answer to that question, they would find those to be factors.
Kids draw a picture in art class, and come home a week later with a magnet that has been printed with their drawing. They also have an invoice saying you can order these other things (mugs, shirts, etc), and we've included a sample magnet so you can see what the printing looks like.
But the magnet isn't free — if you want to keep it, you're supposed to pay 6 bucks, or you can return it to the basket where the order slips go.
Now of course no kid wants their artwork to be sent back and destroyed, so they want you to keep it. And since that forces you to fill out the order form, perhaps you'll order something else while you're at it.
Of course, the prices are terrible compared to vistaprint/costco/etc. And since you have the original art (that your kid made), if you want to have a shirt printed up, you can do so for half the price elsewhere.
This practice is totally illegal (where I am, in California). You can't send someone a thing and then charge them if they don't send it back. I was surprised and disappointed that our public school would partner with a company that literally breaks the law, to the detriment of students and their families.
If they give random things to kids then the parent is not on the hook to make sure those things are returned.
> I was surprised and disappointed that our public school would partner with a company
The company gave money to an admin or the district.
ADT (the big home security company) had someone come to my house that I recently bought. He insisted he was not a salesman. He pretended that the house had previously been using their services (but didn't out right say it). He asked if the escrow office informed me, and said that their system was 'already set up'.
Of course, it wasn't. It was a ploy but a confusing, sinister one.
It's troubling that such a large company can get away with this legally.
It's also not surprising that the merchants of fear (selling security) are employing such tactics.
No, but you are getting older and wiser.
The idea was people can choose a better "supplier" - maybe it's a famous brand or they liked the TV advert or it just offers better prices. These days a lot of them offer "100% Green electricity". You're getting the same electricity as ever, but they've got a spreadsheet which shows they bought the requisite amount of "credits" for solar or wind or whatever not coal. Not quite pointless, but maybe about the same practical impact as signing a petition. Anyway of course it turns out consumers don't like change (this is the Conservative party, you'd think they might know a thing or two about that) and so most people stuck with the "incumbent" they were assigned based on where they lived even if it had worse customer service and higher prices.
But just keeping 80+% of the market wasn't enough. Incumbent suppliers wanted 100% of "their" market, so for way too long (until businesses actually got fined real money for this after being caught on camera too often) they'd do stuff like a sales guy is given a badge which says "District manager" or something, not "Sales" - and dressed up like an actual maintenance guy and he shows up at homes that have switched to a different supplier. He's all apologetic, "Sorry to bother you," but he just needs you to sign some paperwork because of a "problem". Maybe he looks at a meter, pretends to examine the cables or pipework... He doesn't mention that he's a sales person and the "problem" is that you're paying less money to somebody else for the same product. You sign, "All done, you won't have any more problems" and you only find out when the bill arrives from an unfamiliar supplier what sort of "problem" it was you were having.
Of course if you spent a few minutes reading the paperwork it says what you're signing, so it won't fool the average HN reader, but "Technically not scamming most smart people" isn't the standard we ought to be setting for anybody, much less essential utilities.
It's a bad look for a security company.
Fortunately the Trademark Office warns everyone who registers a trademark that they can expect to receive something along these lines, but of course the idea is that in a big company the "invoice" might get paid by someone in too much of a hurry to look carefully.
Which is one reason why public records should not include any personal information, particularly including addresses or other contact/location information.
It's ridiculous. Everybody knows it's a scam, they even give themselves official-sounding names to pretend that they are the official registry, and yet the government just folds and says "I guess we can't do anything". It's a joke.
Scambaiting has been popular on Youtube for years. They seem to be the only ones doing anything about it.
The arrests last November in India shutting down the call center was a rarity.
For example they might oblige the company to tell (albeit not necessarily very obviously in headline fonts) its new "independent business owners" that only 0.01% of such "independent business owners" make any money at all in a typical year's operations. That's the sort of sobering statistic that might persuade some other gullible people to reconsider. Or not.
But just going in and shutting down the business - they're not keen. After all, the same victims will likely just sign up for another and perhaps even more predatory pyramid scheme.
My favourite scheme (I used to research these) had a setup where they sold basically mediocre fruit juice as a health product, and it's a pyramid scheme but then the extra genius is that the product sold through this pyramid scheme is itself bogus. So even the underlying business, ignoring the pyramid structure, is crooked anyway. The corporations were set up such that if the pyramid scheme is busted it has no money, all the "real" profit went to the notionally separate company making mediocre fruit juice. They can claim ignorance of the pyramid scheme and of the bogus health claims, everything, and they keep all the money. Brilliant.
You deem to be describing Multi Level Marketing.
It was written in a way that made it easy to miss the fact that the sender of the letter was not my registrar. IIRC, the letter contained scary language like "you must renew to keep your domain name!".
I only noticed the fine print that said it was a solicitation for business because I was curious why this other registrar was contacting me.
Better to make sure the company gets it so they have to pay someone to open it.
Do you have a source for this? What do they do with it then?
The only ("only") problem I personally have is that it generates soooo much waste. It is always so frustrating checking the mail, and immediately dropping 10 or so sheets of paper in the trash before I even close the mailbox (the safeway mailer is especially bad at this...)
I once when I lived in a rural area, with a small PO received a despicable scam focusing on elders, containing a return-postage-guaranteed envelope. The postmistress couldn't provide direct instructions, but enough for me to surmise that anything I could actually fit in the envelope would work.
I filled it as full as possible with thin lead sheet (often used for flashing around chimney-roof intersections), a bit of reinforcing clear packing tape around the edges, and a nasty note. When I brought it back for mailing, I got a bit of a smile and assurance that it would go properly.
Satisfying, and if everyone did it...
Not going to link (tbh, anyone can probably find this guy/his picture/videos online) in case this turns out to be a case of mistaken identity (the guy who raised the money is 100% the guy Krebs is talking about...maybe Krebs is wrong though) but...if this is true...it seems that some well-regarded people really didn't do their due diligence.
That is not rare at all. Lots of scammers try to milk investors. Usually unsuccessfully but sometimes they score, and sometimes they score big too.
Scamming institutional investors isn't unusual. I know the lead investor on the deal is one of these PE/VC bubble firms that sprung up in the last ten years. But there are people involved who are definitely not stupid.
Also, the company is most certainly not a scam. Again, I heard about them years ago, and they have a legitimate business selling to consumers (i.e. it is fairly straightforward to check if the business exists).
I'm surprised to see so much talk congratulating Krebs on his skilful fact-finding, and seemingly no mention of informing the authorities.
This comment [0] points out that it's likely against the law in the USA. (I think the relevant law is at the federal level.) It seems likely that Scotland's laws are similar.
I get the sense that a lot of people think it's obvious the law can do nothing, so there's no point even reporting the guy. I don't see the sense in this. I imagine scammers benefit greatly from this kind of thinking.
it gets redirected to:
http://107.170.104.233/online/
Says secure payment on a NON-SSL site. Sounds pretty shady.
This appears to be him: https://www.bellaandduke.com/our-story/
His latest scam involves a terrible DIY website hocking "healthy" dog food