fraud

In the film, The Transporter, there are several rules for using the courier service Jason Statham offers. One is "Don't open the package."

In this utterly ridiculous spam-scam, someone using a gmail address that Google should be required to verify rights to but chooses not to, is pretending to be a courier - and to know what's in the package. The silly thing is that even if he was a courier and even if he did open the package he would not know the information upon which the fraud is predicated.

This spam-scam is remarkable. It's as if the sender thinks that by throwing everything at the wall, something will stick. But for the even slightly alert, it fails before the target even opens it.

As governments around the world ponder the possibility of making banks liable for losses suffered by customers who are the victims of e.g. phishing scams, there are companies that actively assist the fraudsters to get away with it. Let's start at the top: Google.

It's been modified from the advance fee fraud e-mails that we are used to and someone has been to writing lessons.

It starts with an unusual approach, then moves into the same technique as we've seen from this name dozens of times over many years.

Oh, and he uses UN.ORG as the "from" address. Cheeky.

Today's Top Five financial crime risk and compliance stories.

This morning, a spam-scam arrived claiming that a subscription had been renewed.

Then a few minutes later, we came across a news article that had something in common.

Is it pure coincidence?

The Journal of Clinical Investigation is a genuine scientific journal.

However, fraudsters have used its name to attract attention to a rogue website.

The Carbolic Smoke Ball case gave carte blanch for businesses to lie so long as they didn't go too far.

But that related to the efficacy of their products.

Here's an extraordinarily blatant lie that is so common that it's a surprise that it's not stamped on as a matter of policy.