by Angela Lehew

Created on: July 19, 2010

It takes a lot of work to be a professional, white collar criminal. Since the public is becoming more scam savvy, these criminals have dedicated themselves to research and creative brainstorming in order to birth the next great scam.  Technology, specifically the Internet, has afforded many of them the luxury of doing so from the comfort of home and probably in a bathrobe purchased with a stolen credit card.

You don’t have to tell Lorna Coleman how prevalent Internet scams are, in a one year period this sometime user Craigslist, has been approached twice by scammers.  Both times she picked up on the fraud before she was out any money but everyone isn’t as lucky.

Both scammers Lorna encountered attempted to get her to cash fraudulent cashier’s checks and send the excess money back once her payment was deducted.  Had she complied, she would have been out $8000 plus any bank fees, and may have lost her checking account. That doesn’t even address potential legal ramifications she may have faced.

There are many variances to this, but in cashier's check scams, a fraudulent cashier's check written for an amount that greatly exceeds the amount for the item or service is sent to the victim. The check is then cashed using the victims bank account and the victim as instructed sends the excess funds back to the scammer.  Using the knowledge Lorna had when she was propositioned, we can arm ourselves to prevent becoming a victim as well.

1. Scammers request what seems to be harmless information. Name, address, phone number, age and profession are common.  They refrain from requesting your social security number; it’s become one of the biggest and widely known red flags for fraud.

2. Cashier’s checks are sent over night.  This method of funding doesn’t signify authenticity; over night fees are actually a small price to pay if a scammer stands to make thousands.

3. Telephone contact is usually never made. Neither of Lorna’s scammers would comply with her repeated requests to solidify the deal by phone. Both claimed to be too busy and wasn’t that the truth – crime is a time consuming business.

4. Scammers are not particular to what category they post  nor do they lack creativity.  Lorna’s first scam came from an ad she posted for artwork for sale and the second was a potential employer with an ad in the jobs

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