FTC

UPDATED 9:47 A.M. ET (U.S.A.) Coincidence? Part of the new partnership the FTC announced yesterday with Craigslist that urges consumers to be on the lookout for scams when responding to job and business opportunity ads online? Messages urging caution are appearing in Craigslist ads for NarcThatCar, the Dallas-based company that says it is building a […]

An inmate operated a collect-call “cramming” scheme from a Florida state prison by hiding his ownership of three firms, federal prosecutors said. Willoughby Farr, 46, of West Palm Beach, has been indicted on six counts of mail fraud and two counts of wire fraud. He faces a maximum prison sentence of 160 years, if convicted […]

The Federal Trade Commission has announced a major sweep involving numerous companies and defendants — and a new partnership with Craigslist, Microsoft, Monster.com and CareerBuilder to combat employment and work-at-home fraud. Meanwhile, the agency said it was working with AARP’s Legal Counsel for the Elderly to keep America’s senior citizens’ pocketbooks out of the clutches […]

Still pushing work-at-home schemes on the Internet? The Federal Trade Commission has a message for you. On Wednesday, the FTC will announce a major “law enforcement sweep cracking down on job and work-at-home fraud fueled by the economic downturn,” the agency said. Investigators will release “[s]till shots from the Web sites of some of the […]

EDITOR’S NOTE: Recidivism, the tendency to continue committing crimes or breaking laws even after getting caught and perhaps even going to prison, is a common theme in the scam universe. It has been an element in many recent cases we’ve written about, including the AdSurfDaily Ponzi scheme case (principals Andy Bowdoin and Clarence Busby had […]

A court-appointed receiver has described the accounting records of Affiliate Strategies Inc. (ASI) as a mess, saying “an opinion on the accuracy of these records is not possible without an extensive audit that would require significant additional costs.” ASI is the parent company of the Noobing autosurf, which targeted deaf people in sales promotions. ASI […]

A man has been jailed for ignoring a court order in a civil case and continuing to operate an envelope-stuffing scheme from the area of Rio Grande, Puerto Rico, the Federal Trade Commission announced Dec. 23. Zoilo Cruz, also known as Zoilo Cruz Carrion, conducts business as International Marketing and Universal Wealth. The case was […]

UPDATED 3:17 P.M. ET (U.S.A.) The Federal Trade Commission has asked a federal judge to find attorney Jeffrey S. Benice in contempt of court for failing to turn over $238,300 to a victims’ compensation pool as required. Benice represented Charles Castro in the Network Services Depot Ponzi scheme involving the sale of Internet kiosks. The […]

Dear Readers, From time to time I publish a post in letter form. This usually happens when a post in story, editorial or essay form does not seem appropriate. This is one of those times. Honestly, just how strange could things get in Ponzi Land? Ponzi Land, which relatively few people outside of law enforcement […]

When the AdViewGlobal (AVG) autosurf — now failed — was in prelaunch phase in December 2008, it positioned itself as an offshore cure for what ails the U.S. and world economies. Less than two years earlier, promoters of the AdSurfDaily autosurf — which has close ties to AVG — implied that the individual surf accounts […]

A federal judge found a man implicated in an elaborate fraud scheme in contempt of court and ordered him to turn over his Las Vegas home to a court-appointed receiver or go to jail. It was the second time Richard C. Neiswonger was found to have been in contempt of court, according to the Federal […]