YouTube is removing videos for JustBeenPaid, a “program’ linked to Frederick Mann and popularized by scammers on Ponzi boards such as TalkGold and MoneyMakerGroup.
JustBeenPaid promos feature claims of remarkable returns.
The removed videos carry messages such as “This video has been removed as a violation of YouTube’s policy against spam, scams, and commercially deceptive content” and “This video is no longer available because the YouTube account associated with this video has been terminated.” Some JustBeenPaid videos remain on the popular video site. It was unclear if YouTube plans to remove all of them.
JustBeenPaid appears to feed itself through a “program” called JSS Tripler and also appears to be tied to something called Synergy Surf. The program, which is foundering, became a Ponzi darling in the days after Club Asteria slashed payouts and then suspended them altogether earlier this year.
Ponzi forum posts identity Mann as the JustBeenPaid braintrust.
There is a claim today on the MoneyMakerGroup Ponzi cesspit that JustBeenPaid members were provided the likenesses of celebrities to promote the “program.”
Just last month, an image of actor Will Smith was featured in a Club Asteria promo. The image was removed after the PP Blog contacted Smith’s publicist. It is common for fraud schemes to trade on the names of celebrities and to plant the seed that celebrities endorse a specific program when no such endorsement exists.
One apparent Just Been Paid fan on MoneyMaker Group suggested his control over hundreds of YouTube accounts would enable him to circumvent any ban YouTube enacts against Just Been Paid.
“No sweat, I own over 500 Youtube accounts, so I’ll just keep making videos like normal, plus I can always use Viddler and Windows movie maker and facebook video as well,” MoneyMakerGroup poster “gtprosperity” claimed.
BULLETIN: The CFTC has gone to federal court in Florida, charging a company and six individuals in an alleged international Forex and commodities fraud scheme that gathered at least $1.7 million and bilked residents of Florida, California and Puerto Rico.
Charged in the case were Alpha Trade Group S.A. (ATG), which also is known as Revolution Network Ltd. of Panama. Individual defendants include Jose Cecilio Martinez Beltran of Orlando; Welinton Bautista Castillo of Orlando; Maria Alvarez Gutierrez of Orlando; Yehodiz Padua Valentin of Orlando; and Maria Asela Rodriguez of Orlando.
Francisco Amaury Suero Matos of Mexico also was charged.
Customers were solicited to invest in commodity pools known as Orsa Investment Group LLC and Online Marketing Solutions, the CFTC charged. Investments were positioned as “risk free” with payouts of up to 25.5 percent a month.
Records show that the scheme was promoted on the Ponzi cesspits MoneyMakerGroup and TalkGold.
This screen shot shows the first post about Alpha Trade Group appeared at the MoneyMakerGroup Ponzi forum on Oct. 7, 2009 — days after a U.S. bank already had closed an account linked to the scheme amid fears it was being used to launder money.
A small sum of money is believed to have gone to a trading company in Anguilla, but the defendants misappropriated “at least several hundred thousand dollars of pool participant funds for their own personal benefit, including financing international trips to Spain, Switzerland and Panama,” the CFTC charged.
Customers were given bogus statements that showed fictitious returns, the CFTC said.
The bizarre descent into chaos of a failing “program” that claimed to be moving to “offshore” servers and once made its participants swear they were not government spies or media lackeys has gotten stranger yet.
Poster “10BucksUp,” who’s now flogging the JustBeenPaid “program,” falsely claimed on the MoneyMakerGroup Ponzi forum today that the PP Blog posts on MoneyMakerGroup as “ISPY” and published a link to the Blog on the forum to discredit him.
The PP Blog is not “ISPY” and does not post on MoneyMakerGroup under any identity. Nor does the Blog communicate with “ISPY” in any fashion, know his (or her) identity or encourage “ISPY” directly or indirectly to post links to the Blog. The Blog has never encouraged any member of MoneyMakerGroup — or any other Ponzi scheme forum — to post links to the Blog.
It is somewhat common for posters on Ponzi boards, including so-called “naysayers,” to post links to the Blog’s coverage of schemes-in-progress or schemes gone bust. It also is somewhat common for Ponzi board promoters to exhibit paranoia about the Blog’s reporting and even claim the Blog is part of a U.S. government operation.
Prior to asserting that “ISPY” was the PP Blog, “10BucksUp” accused ISPY of threatening him. ISPY denied threatening “10BucksUp.”
“10BucksUp” rose to Ponzi forum prominence as a pitchman and apologist for ClubAsteria, which became the subject of a probe by the Italian securities regulator CONSOB in May, had its PayPal account frozen, slashed weekly payouts to members and then eliminated the payouts.
Meanwhile, “10BucksUp” also acknowledged today that he was a member of the collapsed Cherry Shares HYIP. In June, Cherry Shares was referenced in freeze and trade orders brought by The Autorité des marchés financiers (AMF), the securities regulator for the province of Quebec in Canada.
The acknowledgement by “10BucksUp” of his Cherry Shares involvement means that he was participating in a second “program” that had come under government scrutiny — but nevertheless plowed headlong into JustBeenPaid.
Earlier this month, “10BucksUp” advised members of JustBeenPaid that late-entry members were engaging in hurtful and “drastic measures” if they filed disputes with AlertPay. Among other things, JustBeenPaid has asserted it is a “private association.”
The AdViewGlobal (AVG) autosurf made the same claim prior to its collapse in June 2009. AVG was one of the so-called AdSurfDaily clones — each of which launched (and collapsed) after the August 2008 seizure by the U.S. Secret Service of tens of millions of dollars in a Ponzi scheme investigation.
Today’s false MoneyMakerGroup claims about the PP Blog also occurred against the backdrop of a securities fraud case brought by the SEC against Jody Dunn, an alleged pitchman for Imperia Invest IBC. Imperia Invest also was promoted on MoneyMakerGroup and TalkGold, and the SEC charged that Dunn had promoted it blindly and relied on claims made by the purported opportunity, rather than conducting any actual due diligence.
Millions of dollars directed at Imperia Invest went missing, the SEC charged.
“You want to arrest me? [G]o ahead,” 10BucksUp wrote on MoneyMakerGroup today. “Send a Secret Service/US Seal/intergalactic commando force in my little 3rd world village. Afterall, that is what some Americans think of us right? We all should live under your whims, at what you dictate as legal and not illegal. And then when somebody else invoke that ‘power’ against you, you cry ‘dont tread on me’ or ‘taxed enough already[.”]
“Go ahead with your crusade, Mr ISPY/Patrick Pretty/Twerp,” 10BuckUp continued. “Clean up the world of garbages like us. There are millions of us. I hope you can finish up in your lifetime.”
10BucksUp did not say whether he believed U.S. and other world citizens unwise to the ways of the Ponzi pitchman should simply remain silent after they recognize they’ve been scammed and permit fraudsters to steal their money. Nor did he say whether he believed the U.S. government was making a mistake in prosecuting fraudsters who have disappeared with tens of millions of dollars in recent cases such as Legisi and Pathway to Prosperity — in an era of terrorism and economic uncertainty.
The combined haul of the Legisi, Pathway to Prosperity and ASD “opportunities” was about $250 million, according to court filings. Separately, the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) said last year that Genius Funds, a collapsed HYIP, had gathered $400 million.
Like Club Asteria, JustBeenPaid and Cherry Shares, Legisi, Pathway To Prosperity, ASD, AVG and Genius Funds were promoted on the Ponzi boards.
FINRA specifically warned last year that HYIP fraud schemes spread on the Internet through social media and forums.
“10BucksUp” said today that he used a “a free, blogger blog” to promote Club Asteria. Blogger is part of Google’s Blogspot platform.
"ABOUT US" and "JOIN NOW" buttons — each punctuated with exclamation points — appear below this image of actor Will Smith in Club Asteria's September 2011 house organ. The PP Blog has cropped this screen shot not to show Smith's face, but his face appears in the Club Asteria promo.
UPDATED 1:47 P.M. EDT (U.S.A. OCT. 29, 2011.) An image of famed actor and rapper Will Smith appears in Club Asteria’s September house organ, an online glossy used by the firm to recruit affiliates across the world. It was unclear if Smith had knowledge of the promo or had authorized Club Asteria to use his likeness.
A link to the publication featuring the image of Smith appeared on the TalkGold Ponzi forum yesterday. TalkGold is referenced in federal court filings as a place from which international fraud schemes are promoted.
Smith’s publicists at the 42West agency in Los Angeles had no immediate comment on the promo when contacted today by the PP Blog, which provided a link to the Club Asteria publication. The entertainer’s image appears on Page 7 of the September gusher.
Buttons using the words “LEARN MORE!” “ABOUT US! and “JOIN NOW!” appear a short distance below the image of Smith. But readers who press the buttons do not receive information about Smith. Rather, the buttons forward to Club Asteria’s website. The “JOIN NOW” button, for instance, takes readers to Club Asteria’s registration page.
The presence of the image of Smith, the wording and design of the page and the positioning of the buttons lead to questions about whether the “Independence Day” and “Men in Black” star had endorsed the purported Club Asteria opportunity or whether Club Asteria was trying to create the impression among readers that he was a spokesman for the company.
In May, Club Asteria promotions were banned in Italy by the Italian securities regulator CONSOB. The agency has published its orders and findings on Club Asteria affiliate websites in Italy.
It is common for shady promoters of multilevel-marketing (MLM) “opportunities” to plant the seed in promos that a particular product or service is endorsed by a celebrity when no actual endorsement exists.
A headline of “Will Smith Inspires the World With Enthusiasm for Life, Work & People!” appears above the image of Smith in the Club Asteria promo.
A deck below the headline uses these words, “An Interview With Will Smith,” suggesting that Club Asteria itself had a direct connection to him. In a short blurb below the deck, readers are told that the “interview” and “discussion” with Smith will inform them about the wisdom he gained “throughout his journey to success” and that Smith will explain “the importance of extraordinary dreams.”
A button to a video — apparently one that appeared on YouTube and is being reframed inside the house organ — appears below the image of Smith. When clicked, the video loads footage of an interview with Smith conducted by 60 Minutes reporter Steve Kroft (NOTE: This paragraph was edited on Oct. 29, 2011, to reflect that Kroft, not Scott Pelley, conducted the 60 Minutes’ interview.) As the video proceeds, it loads footage of Smith being interviewed by broadcaster Charlie Rose. It then works in footage of a Smith interview on NBC’s Today show and a Smith interview on the “Ellen” show. Footage from other shows also are spliced into the video.
Club Asteria reportedly recruited more than 300,000 members in a worldwide promotional blitz that traded on the name of the World Bank. Hundreds — if not thousands — of promos for the firm claimed Club Asteria was a program that provided a weekly return on investment of between 3 percent and 10 percent. The offers were targeted at the world’s poor, with Club Asteria positioned as a company that could lift them out of poverty.
Club Asteria was widely promoted on forums associated with Ponzi schemes and the sale of unregistered securities. Members said Club Asteria first slashed weekly payouts to members in the spring and then eliminated them. Club Asteria announced in May that its PayPal account had been frozen, a development it blamed on members.
In various promos prior to the PayPal freeze, Club Asteria affiliates preemptively denied Club Asteria was operating a Ponzi scheme. Club Asteria managing member Andrea Lucas, whom the World Bank said in March once held a staff position at the bank, last worked for the bank in 1986 — 25 years ago.
Lucas was described in promos for Club Asteria as a former “Director,” chairman and vice president of the World Bank. Images of Hank Needham, another Club Asteria principal, appeared in 2008 promos for AdSurfDaily.
In August of that year, the U.S. Secret Service seized tens of millions of dollars from the personal bank accounts of ASD President Andy Bowdoin, alleging that he was presiding over an international Ponzi scheme.
Bowdoin was arrested on criminal charges of wire fraud, securities fraud and selling unregistered securities in December 2010. His trial is pending. Like Club Asteria, ASD also was promoted on Ponzi boards such as TalkGold and MoneyMakerGroup, which is listed in federal court filings as a place from which the alleged Pathway To Prosperity and Legisi Ponzi schemes were promoted.
ASD, Pathway To Prosperity and Legisi created tens of thousands of victims globally and fraudulently obtained a combined total of about $250 million, according to court filings.
An Imperia Invest IBC promoter continued to make excuses and cloud the issues even after the SEC released printed warnings and warnings in American Sign Language that the purported opportunity was an international scam that stole millions of dollars from deaf investors and others, the agency said today. (See link to videocast below.)
ALERT >> MOVING: A deaf promoter of an online program that stole millions of dollars from deaf investors knew the purported Imperia Invest IBC opportunity did not come as advertised but nevertheless continued to promote it, siphoning money from fellow deaf investors and using it to make his mortgage, car, insurance and other payments, the SEC said.
Even after Imperia Invest was exposed as an obvious fraud that advertised a preposterous daily return that projected to an annual rate in the hundreds of percent, promoter Jody Myung Dunn insisted he was owed $163 million from his personal investment of $1,100, the SEC charged.
Dunn, 43, of Corinth, Texas, has no broker/dealer or securities credentials, and currently is unemployed and drawing disability benefits, the SEC said. He has been charged with securities fraud, selling unregistered securities and acting unlawfully as a broker or dealer amid charges that he blindly promoted an international scam that consumed more than $7 million and made at least $3.45 million belonging to his personal customers vanish.
In stunning allegations outlined today, the agency accused Dunn of acting as an Imperia rainmaker who recruited deaf investors into a quagmire. The purported opportunity was widely promoted on the Ponzi boards, including TalkGold and MoneyMakerGroup.
The SEC sued Imperia in October 2010, saying it was running a Traded Endowment Policies (TEP) scam. Dunn continued to make excuses for the scam even after the SEC released a printed Investor Alert and a videocast warning in American Sign Language, the SEC charged.
“Dunn was aware that Imperia lost investor money and was not accurately crediting investor accounts, yet he continued to send investor money to Imperia without disclosing to investors what was happening,” said Kenneth D. Israel, director of the SEC’s Salt Lake Regional Office. “To further take advantage of others in the deaf community, Dunn was siphoning off about 10 percent of the money he collected from investors to pay his own bills before sending the rest of money into the Imperia quagmire.”
Dunn, the SEC charged, formed a Nevada corporation known as Global Wealth Lifepath in May 2009 and established a bank account into which investors’ Imperia funds were deposited and then wired to Imperia. Meanwhile, Dunn started a second company — possibly outside the United States — and named it Dunn World Investments (DWI). A bank account established for DWI also was used as part of the Imperia fraud, the agency charged.
Despite red flags aplenty such as a purported guaranteed return of 1.2 percent a day, Dunn “blindly” promoted the Imperia scheme — even wiring money to bank accounts in Cyprus and New Zealand that had “no apparent or obvious link to Imperia,” the SEC charged.
About 7,133 deaf investors entrusted about $3.45 million to Dunn, who accepted their funds directly and scraped about $350,000 off the top, claiming to have sent the balance to Imperia’s offshore bank accounts, the SEC charged.
Although Dunn claimed “he had met and knew the individuals behind Imperia,” it was a lie, the SEC charged.
And in an allegation that may cause great discomfort to Ponzi board promoters, Dunn was accused of not conducting “even a minimum amount of due diligence” about Imperia, not confirming that the firm actually traded in TEPs and not confirming whether any required licensing or registration documentation existed, the SEC charged.
“Dunn testified that his only due diligence consisted of reading the Imperia website, attempting to verify Imperia’s URL address, and reviewing the information Imperia posted on its own website regarding its website host,” the SEC charged.
In his testimony, Dunn described Imperia as a “secretive company” that owed him $163 million in back commissions and interest on his investment of $1,100, the SEC charged.
Despite Imperia’s clandestine nature and Dunn’s inability even to find a verifiable street address for the company, Dunn still decided to plow headlong into the scheme and draft others into doing the same.
Imperia made off with at least $7 million, the SEC said last year.
A Club Asteria pitchman flogging multiple HYIP schemes on the TalkGold Ponzi forum says that late-entry members of a teetering “program” known as “JustBeenPaid” are engaging in hurtful and “drastic measures” if they file disputes with AlertPay.
Filing a dispute means that “all members will suffer,” according to serial HYIP pitchman “10BucksUp.”
“10BucksUp” rose to Ponzi-board prominence earlier this year in his shilling for ClubAsteria, a U.S.-based company that traded on the name of the World Bank, had its PayPal account frozen, became a subject of an investigation by Italian regulators and suspended member cashouts.
Screen shot: From a government evidence exhibit in the Legisi case. Legisi, an HYIP Ponzi scheme promoted on TalkGold and MoneyMakerGroup,made members certify they were not government spies. JustBeenPaid, a hybrid HYIP scheme now in an apparent state of collapse, sought to do the same thing, according to its member agreement.
Undaunted, “10BucksUp” — like other Club Asteria pitchmen — turned his promotional attentions to JustBeenPaid, which appears to feed itself through something known as “JSSTripler.”
JustBeenPaid claimed it was a “private association.” The “program’s” member agreement called for participants to “affirm that I am not an employee or official of any government agency.”
Participants also had to certify that they were not “acting on behalf of or collecting information for or on behalf of any government agency.” Meanwhile, they had to certify that “I am not an employee, by contract or otherwise, of any media or research company, and I am not reading any of the JBP pages in order to collect information for someone else.”
A Ponzi forum uproar began when JustBeenPaid’s website recently began to malfunction. A person who identified himself as a recent registrant threatened on TalkGold today file a dispute with AlertPay.
“10BucksUp” counseled the JustBeenPaid member to “[p]lease just calm down.”
“I am pretty sure they are doing their best to make the new system work,” 10BucksUp continued, without describing how he’d arrived at his notion of being “pretty sure” and whether being “pretty sure” constituted legitimate due diligence and proper consumer advice.
“I just think that the priorities are screwed as the logging in right now even without the member id thing should work within this week,” 10BucksUp opined. “New members like you are becoming restless I know, but try to understand if you do such drastic measures then all members will suffer.”
Whether the late-entrant enrollee, who also is pitching multiple schemes on Talk Gold, will file a dispute is unclear. What is clear is that AlertPay enabled both Club Asteria and JustBeenPaid and that both “programs” are in a state of decay.
Among other things, JustBeenPaid announced last month that it was “moving to new offshore servers” and that the transition could take weeks.
“10BucksUp” did not explain why a dispute to a payment processor by a late entrant in JustBeenPaid who is apt to have joined a global Ponzi scheme constituted a “drastic measure.” Nor did he explain his apparent belief that late-entry registrants had a duty to suffer their Ponzi losses gladly so the early entrants had a chance to continue getting paid.
In 2010, the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority called the HYIP sphere a “bizarre substratum of the Internet.”
Club Asteria was widely promoted on the Ponzi boards, which led to questions about whether the Virginia-based firm with a purported Hong Kong subsidiary was selling unregistered securities on a global scale and collecting tainted proceeds from other HYIP schemes. The firm’s offer was targeted at the world’s poor.
A collapsed HYIP Ponzi scheme known as Legisi also was promoted on the Ponzi boards. Like JustBeenPaid, it sought to have registrants certify they were not government spies.
BULLETIN: After a securities investigator emailed a “program” admin for information in 2008, the state of Oregon systematically destroyed the carcass of a collapsed 2X2 cycler in a months-long probe that exposed a secondary scheme, according to records.
Kristopher K. Keeney, a recidivist offender with a P.O. Box in Milwaukie, Ore., presided over InC, also known as “I need Cash,” and a partnered in a secondary scheme known as “My Financial Miracle,” the Oregon Department of Consumer and Business Services said. The InC “program” was promoted on TalkGold, MoneyMakerGroup and other Ponzi scheme forums, according to records.
“Not only are pyramid schemes illegal in Oregon, they are destined to fail as they inevitably run out of people to recruit,” said David Tatman, administrator of the department’s Division of Finance and Corporate Securities. “Consumers should always be wary of offers promising high returns or guaranteeing that you cannot lose money.”
Keeney has been fined $345,000, a figure that represents more than three times the known $95,000 take of the scheme, which affected 221 investors in the United States between May 2007 and August 2007, according to records. Officials said he sold securities without a license, sold unregistered securities, lied to investors and “violated a previous agreement with the Oregon Department of Justice, which had prohibited him from promoting a similar multi-level marketing scheme involving charitable entities.”
State filings also reference a third entity known as “Abundant Gold Club,” which became “aligned” with InC in 2007, the state said. Abundant Gold Club also is referenced in InC pitches on the Ponzi boards.
“In Keeney’s pyramid scheme, investors paid $275 for one spot on a matrix and then were required to recruit others to fill a total of seven spots,” the state said. “Once the matrix was filled, the investor would receive a return of $825, of which $275 was automatically reinvested into a new matrix.”
On May 31, 2007, a MoneyMakerGroup poster made this claim about InC.
“THIS WILL EXPLODE FOLKS…A good 2×2 will make tons of money for tons of people… AND…This is IT!”
Records in Oregon suggest the InC scheme went belly-up in only months, and that members were told in September 2007 that the Michigan Attorney General had moved against the firm.
An Oregon investigator, however, contacted Keeney by email more than a year later — in December 2008 — and requested “information about the investment opportunities with InC,” the state said.
“Keeney responded to the DFCS Investigator by stating that he is ‘able to offer 10% per month to those looking for steady growth of funds,’” the state said.
“When further information was requested by the DFCS Investigator, Keeney provided information on My Financial Miracle . . . In information provided to the DFCS Investigator, Keeney stated that MFM can, ‘with 100% certainty,’ provide an investor $1,000 a month for 12 months, two years after the investor provides him with $200.”
UPDATED 2:49 P.M. EDT (U.S.A.) A pitchfest for an apparent cycler matrix called “Fast Profits Daily” has begun on the TalkGold Ponzi forum. Fast Profits Daily shares a street address in Delaware with another apparent matrix program known as “2X2 Prosperity Formula” and a purported vacation program known as “DREAM STYLE VACATIONS, LLC,” according to research.
Why the businesses all use the same address and whether they are affiliated entities was not immediately clear.
Meanwhile, the emerging Fast Profits Daily cycler matrix appears to have links to the AutoXTen cycler matrix and lists Scott Chandler, Randal Williams and Brent Robinson as pitchmen-in-chief on its landing page.
Chandler, Williams and Robinson are “three of the world’s most famous network marketers,” according to the landing page. Until recently, Chandler and Robinson also were associated with AutoXTen, the Jeff Long-promoted scheme enabled by AlertPay.
Long , a former pitchman for Data Network Affiliates and NarcThatCar, said on the firm’s web-based help desk that AutoXTen was suited for churches. The AutoXTen help desk also declared that the firm was relying on AlertPay to avoid PayPal “limits.”
Early info about Fast Profits Daily is bizarre, incongruous and confusing. The PP Blog visited the site yesterday. A launch countdown timer indicated the launch would occur within three hours, conflicting with a printed message that the launch would occur in days.
Today the countdown timer says the launch will occur in fewer than 10 hours. Like yesterday’s countdown timer, the information conflicts with the “days” printed message.
Precisely what Fast Profits Daily is selling is unclear. Website visitors are told that “160 countries” will be involved in an “unprecedented opportunity of a lifetime.” The site also publishes a conflicting report that 140 countries are involved.
“Turn a ONE-TIME $50 or $250 into $1,000, $5,000 even $35,000 over and over monthly, weekly, even daily,” the site advertises.
On a separate page, the site declared in red type that “ALL Purchases are FINAL and NO REFUNDS or CHARGEBACKS are allowed.
“Any attempts to acquire a refund or chargeback constitute theft and fraud, and are grounds for legal prosecution,” the site continues. “Purchaser will be liable for all legal and administrative cost associated with the chargeback and minimum penalty of $500USD. Plus any unused services shall be forfeited upon expiration or termination of services.”
The Fast Profits Daily site also has a headline in red titled, “TRAVEL RELATED REFUNDS / CANCELLATIONS:” Separately, the DREAM STYLE VACATIONS site, which says it accepts AlertPay and Sold Trust Pay, has a headline in red titled, “Travel Related Cancellations/Refunds:” The headline wording is the same as the wording on the Fast Profits Daily site, except the words “cancellations” and “refunds” are transposed.
Fast Profits Daily did not say whether it intended to prosecute senior citizens and other vulnerable individuals who may come to believe they’d been ripped off and filed a dispute or chargeback.
Although Fast Profits Daily did not reveal the choice of law under which the firm operates, its servers appear to resolve to Dallas. The website domain is registered behind a proxy, but the website itself lists its address as:
PMB 6747
2711 Centerville Rd., Ste 120
Wilmington, DE 19808
USA
As noted above, the same address is associated with 2X2 Prosperity Formula. The 2X2 website features a photo of an orange sports car, a luxious home (or perhaps a rental property) — and a happy family, including young children, walking along a beach with an ocean in the background. Also as as noted above, a third “opportunity” known as “DREAM STYLE VACATIONS, LLC” uses the same address.
A promo for Fast Profits Daily was posted on the TalkGold Ponzi forum two days ago. Separately, the MoneyMakerGroup Ponzi forum has a thread for 2X2 Prosperity Formula that appears to have been established in February 2009. Based on the post count in MoneyMakerGroup’s 2X2 thread, the “program” appears not to have gained much traction — but its website remains active.
Like the Fast Profits Daily site, the site for 2X2 Prosperity Formula also appears to be hosted in Dallas.
UPDATE 2:49 P.M: This thread at MLM.com may be useful.
Club Asteria promoter "Ken Russo," aka "DRdave," posted this purported $1,311 payment from Club Asteria June 2 on the TalkGold Ponzi forum.
Club Asteria updated its news website yesterday for the first time since July 21, a period of more than a month. But the Virginia-based company did not address a new order issued Monday by the Italian regulator CONSOB in its three-month-long investigation into how Club Asteria was promoted in Italy.
And neither did Club Asteria promoter “Ken Russo,” who simply copied the entire 854-word puff piece Club Asteria posted on its news website yesterday and pasted it into the Club Asteria thread at the TalkGold Ponzi scheme and criminals’ forum.
Whether “Ken Russo” understands that legitimate companies would be aghast if their affiliates trolled for business and performed PR outreach on known Ponzi forums linked to international fraud schemes that have gathered huge sums of money is unclear. What is clear is that “Ken Russo” is using TalkGold as a cheerleading outlet for Club Asteria — even as he uses it to cheer for other schemes.
Whether Club Asteria will take any sort of action against “Ken Russo” for trolling for business on TalkGold or reproducing 854-word Club Asteria PR pieces verbatim on a known Ponzi forum is not known. “Ken Russo” is hardly the only known Ponzi pimp who has led cheers for Club Asteria on the Ponzi boards, and Club Asteria has benefited from the Ponzi board cheerleading though a series of “I got paid” posts and reports that the firm’s membership roster had swelled into the hundreds of thousands.
Club Asteria now is conceding that it is having trouble launching a suite of new products — and that the delay in launching the suite could extend for another 60 days. Club Asteria buried the news about the specific length of the delay in the fourth paragraph of the puff piece “Ken Russo” regurgitated on TalkGold, after congratulating itself in the first paragraph for its diligence in implementing a new scheme and assuring members “how anxious and excited we all are to see all these new items being produced, tested and the logistics worked out so they can be introduced to our members.”
“Ken Russo” posts as “DRdave” at TalkGold, which is referenced in U.S. court filings as a place from which Ponzi schemes are promoted. He is a figure who elicits nearly constant criticism from the antiscam community for turning a blind eye to fraud schemes while seeking to create plausible deniability of any personal responsibility for permitting fraud to mushroom globally by accepting claims made by “opportunity” sponsors at face value and not questioning obvious incongruities.
If an “opportunity” claims a unique ability to pay spectacular, higher-than-market returns with an accompanying, unverifiable claim that external income streams enable the returns — often in the mind-blowing region of hundreds of percent on an annual basis — “Ken Russo” accepts the claim at face value and parrots it.
On Talk Gold, “Ken Russo” made a claim about Club Asteria that projects to an annual payout of more than 200 percent. Other promoters have claimed Club Asteria had the capacity to pay out more than 500 percent annually — all while claiming Club Asteria also paid affiliate commissions to recruiters. The confluence of payout schemes — combined with the lack of any verifiable information on Club Asteria’s sales figures and income streams and the highly public presence of known Ponzi scheme promoters — strongly suggest that Club Asteria was conducting a global Ponzi scheme
“Ken Russo” previously has claimed on TalkGold to have received thousands of dollars in compensation via wire from Club Asteria, including payments received after Club Asteria’s PayPal account was frozen in May and after CONSOB opened its probe during the same month. Some Club Asteria members, including “Ken Russo,” have claimed they were paid through AlertPay, a payment processor based in Canada.
The full effect of Monday’s order by CONSOB remains unclear because a reliable English translation was not immediately available. The PP Blog has asked both CONSOB and Italy’s Embassy to the United States to provide one, owing to the virality Club Asteria achieved worldwide and the presence of thousands of Club Asteria promos in English. TalkGold features a 137-page thread in English on Club Asteria.
Neither CONSOB nor the Embassy has declined the Blog’s request, which may signal that an official translation could be released in the coming days. CONSOB raised concerns in May that Club Asteria was being promoted illegally in Italy on websites, forums and social-media outlets such as Facebook.
Club Asteria said in June that it was experiencing a cash crunch and that its revenue had plunged “dramatically,” blaming members for events and comparing the situation to a bank run. Club Asteria first slashed members’ weekly cashouts from an apparent norm of between 3 percent and 4 percent a week, and then suspended cashouts altogether.
Some Club Asteria members claimed that the company paid out up to 10 percent a week, and scores of promoters globally are believed to have offered prospects inducements to join, including the partial reimbursement of sign-up fees. Many — if not most — of those members likely locked in losses for both themselves and their downlines by offering the inducements because their costs could not be retired after Club Asteria itself suspended cashouts.
It is common on the Ponzi boards for posters to offer inducements as a lure to attract prospects to join schemes of all stripes. When “Ken Russo” was promoting the purported MPB Today “grocery” program on the Ponzi boards last year, he advertised that one of his downline members was offering prospects cash rebates of $50 to join MPB Today.
An untold number of Club Asteria promoters offered similar inducements to their prospects while encouraging new enrollees to do the same, a situation that could have caused Club Asteria’s coffers to fill with cash. It is not known if Club Asteria affiliates who pledged to partially reimburse their recruits sign-up fees have honored their pledges in the aftermath of the firm’s decision to suspend weekly cashouts.
What is known is that the Club Asteria offer was targeted at the world’s poor — and that the firm may have gained penetration in 150 or more nations. Italy is believed to be the first nation to publicly ban Club Asteria promoters.
Club Asteria promoter "Ken Russo," aka "DRdave," posted this purported payment of $5,462.80 from AutoXTen July 13 on TalkGold
When not regurgitating Club Asteria fluff on TalkGold, “Ken Russo” is helping an “opportunity” known as AutoXTen gain a head of steam on TalkGold. On July 13, “Ken Russo” claimed on TalkGold to have received a payment of “$5462.80” via AlertPay for “AutoXTen.”
“Thanks AutoXTen!” “Ken Russo wrote, posting as “DRdave.” Join us today! Just $10 to get started!!”
AutoXTen has been linked to Jeff Long, a pitchman for both the Data Network Affiliates (DNA) and Narc That Car MLM schemes last year. DNA, in turn, was linked to serial MLM pitchman Phil Piccolo, known online as the “one-man Internet crime wave.”
Both DNA and Narc That Car carded an “F” grade from the Better Business Bureau, the BBB’s lowest score. Some promoters then attacked the BBB.
Long now says the AutoXTen scheme is appropriate for churches — a claim DNA made about its scheme.
“Ken Russo” also is promoting Centurion Wealth Circle, an AlertPay-enabled scheme whose earlier cycler scheme collapsed. Centurion, which also was widely promoted on Ponzi boards such as TalkGold, now is attempting to revive itself by incorporating a new cycler known as “The Tornado.”
On July 13, ClubAsteria promoter "Ken Russo," aka "DRdave," posted these purported payments from Centurion Wealth Circle totaling $276 on TalkGold.
On July 11, two days before he reported a payment of “$5462.80” from Long’s AutoXTen scheme, “Ken Russo” reported on TalkGold (as “DRdave”) that he had received three Centurion payments totaling $276.
This claim followed on the heels of claims by “Ken Russo” (as “DRdave”) that he had received $2,032 from Club Asteria between late May and late June.
The claims raise the prospect that multiple schemes, including Club Asteria, AutoXTen and Centurion, have come into possession and redistributed money from other fraud schemes promoted on the Ponzi boards.
And because “Ken Russo” is hardly alone in his Ponzi forum efforts to promote Club Asteria and any number of schemes in addition to Club Asteria, it raises the prospect that every single one of the schemes is shuffling fraud proceeds back and forth.
“Ken Russo,” for example, could have used proceeds from any number of schemes to join Club Asteria and any number of emerging schemes — with his downline members doing the same thing.
The 'Insectrio' HYIP used the logos of the MoneyMakerGroup, TalkGold and DreamTeamMoney Ponzi forums in its sales pitch.
UPDATE:(UPDATED 11:53 A.M. EDT (U.S.A.) RealScam.com is reporting that the website of a bizarre HYIP known as “Insectrio” will not resolve.
As the PP Blog reported on May 27, Insectrio was emerging as a darling on the Ponzi boards. The purported “opportunity” even used a graphic showing the logos of TalkGold, MoneyMakerGroup and DreamTeamMoney in its vomitous sales pitch.
Insectrio advertised an “Egg” plan purported to pay 103 percent after one day, a “Larva” plan purported to pay 120 percent after five days and other plans advertised to pay even more. It was enabled by the offshore processors LibertyReserve and PerfectMoney, both of which are listed in the SEC’s October 2010 complaint against Imperia Invest IBC as processors that allegedly gathered money for Imperia.
Imperia was accused to stealing millions of dollars from deaf people. Its “program” also was promoted on the Ponzi boards.
Efforts to popularize Insectrio on the Ponzi boards were beginning at roughly the same time the popularity of Club Asteria was waning on the fraud cesspits. Club Asteria targeted its offer to the world’s poor. It reportedly suspended payouts weeks ago, although some members of the Ponzi boards say they continue to get paid through AlertPay, a Canadian processor.
UPDATED 9:45 P.M. EDT (U.S.A.) AlertPay, a Canadian payment processor referenced frequently on Ponzi boards such as TalkGold and MoneyMakerGroup, announced on its Blog that it was subjected to a “large” DDoS attack last week that affected customers’ ability to access the site.
In a Blog post dated Wednesday, the company said the DDoS attack began on Aug. 16.
“We have measures in place to mitigate such attacks but when the intensity of the attack traffic peaks, said measures can occasionally drop legitimate traffic to the site,” AlertPay said. The firm’s website appears to be loading quickly today.
No customer information was compromised in the attack, AlertPay said. The firm did not say whether it had identified a suspect in the attack or whether the attackers had provided a reason for targeting the firm.
“Solving an issue like this unfortunately takes a bit of time to tweak appropriately so please bear with us while we attempt to adjust our filters and improve the situation,” the company said.
AlertPay processes payments for Club Asteria, according to Club Asteria members who complained when Club Asteria reported earlier this year that it had suspended member cashouts after acknowledging its PayPal account had been frozen. Some Club Asteria members reported on the TalkGold Ponzi board that they continued to be paid through AlertPay after the PayPal freeze and despite the payout suspension Club Asteria had announced.
Club Asteria traded on the name of the World Bank, targeting a purported Club Asteria “revenue sharing” offer to the world’s poor.
Promotions for Club Asteria claimed the Virginia-based firm had recruited more than 300,000 members, was gaining thousands of new members each week and was on target to register 1 million members by the end of 2011. Some Club Asteria members simultaneously were promoting a purported “opportunity” known as Centurion Wealth Circle.
In short order, Centurion’s website then disappeared amid reports of a Ponzi collapse, but later reappeared. Reports soon surfaced that Centurion intended to implement a feeder cycler known as “The Tornado” to prop up its original, collapsed cycler. Members claimed AlertPay processed payments for both Centurion and “The Tornado.”
Early reports on the MoneyMakerGroup Ponzi forum about the effectiveness of “The Tornado” in reversing the financial course of Centurion are confusing. Accompanying those reports are confusing reports that a second version of “The Tornado” is coming soon and that Centurion will contact “free” members to make sure they have a chance to pay Centurion for a membership “upgrade” that will permit them to get in on the action.
Prior to its reappearance after an absence of days, Centurion’s DNS information suggested that the firm’s website had been disabled for spamming.
Centurion, according to the MoneyMakerGroup post, now says its first implementation of “The Tornado” resulted in “13 HUNDRED POSITIONS earning many members good commissions & bonuses all round.”
The firm, according to the MoneyMakerGroup post, did not say how much money it gathered in the first use of “The Tornado.”
But a second implementation of “The Tornado” will be tweaked to make it even more “exciting” than the recently completed first, according to the MoneyMakerGroup post, which was dated today.
“The next Tornado will run for 24 hours only,” Centurion was quoted in the MoneyMakerGroup post as saying. “It will consist of just one phase at 200%. The most exciting part is [. . .] we will run a a (sic) two way cycler that wont (sic) cross over each other. What this means is when the left-to-right cycler meets the right-to-left cycler they will both start again!!
“This spreads the profits more evenly and ensures more positions profit – especially the later entries!” Centurion was quoted as saying. “All entries in the Tornado are worth 2 Product Tokens and these will be added to members main account! A Brand NEW Wealth Creation System is coming – Premium Members Only!”
Earlier this year, AlertPay processed payments for Exotic FX, another program widely promoted on the Ponzi boards. Some Club Asteria members also promoted Exotic, which billed itself a “PRIVATE ASSET HAVEN.”
Exotic appears to have collapsed in the spring, roughly at the same time Club Asteria was collapsing. The dollar value of Exotic member losses is unclear, and the firm’s website no longer loads. There were reports that AlertPay had blocked Exotic’s access to funds prior to the collapse. Exotic’s domain now resolves to a page that beams ads.
AlertPay also processed payments for Pathway to Prosperity, which the U.S. Postal Inspection Service described last year as a collapsed $70 million Ponzi scheme that had spread to 120 countries over the Internet and created 40,000 victims.
Separately, AlertPay’s name is referenced in U.S. Secret Service allegations against AdSurfDaily, an autosurf company accused of propping itself up by creating at least three other feeder Ponzi schemes after its original Ponzi scheme collapsed in 2007. The ASD scheme allegedly gathered at least $110 million though a series of payment processors. The firm also used Bank of America to collect payments, according to filings by federal prosecutors and a private racketeering lawsuit brought against ASD President Andy Bowdoin by three ASD members in January 2009.
Hank Needham, a Club Asteria principal, also was an ASD pitchman, according to web records. Club Asteria launched in the aftermath of the Secret Service seizure of tens of millions of dollars from Bowdoin in 2008.
Like Club Asteria, Centurion Wealth Circle, “The Tornado,” Exotic FX and Pathway To Prosperity, ASD also was promoted on the Ponzi boards.
It is common on the Ponzi boards for members to promote two or more fraud schemes simultaneously. One Club Asteria member who also promoted Centurion has claimed he participates in 35 forums.
YouTube is removing videos for JustBeenPaid, a “program’ linked to Frederick Mann and popularized by scammers on Ponzi boards such as TalkGold and MoneyMakerGroup.
You can’t make this stuff up . . .
BULLETIN: After a securities investigator emailed a “program” admin for information in 2008, the state of Oregon systematically destroyed the carcass of a collapsed 2X2 cycler in a months-long probe that exposed a secondary scheme, according to records.
UPDATED 2:49 P.M. EDT (U.S.A.) A pitchfest for an apparent cycler matrix called “Fast Profits Daily” has begun on the TalkGold Ponzi forum. Fast Profits Daily shares a street address in Delaware with another apparent matrix program known as “2X2 Prosperity Formula” and a purported vacation program known as “DREAM STYLE VACATIONS, LLC,” according to research.
UPDATED 9:45 P.M. EDT (U.S.A.) AlertPay, a Canadian payment processor referenced frequently on Ponzi boards such as TalkGold and MoneyMakerGroup, announced on its Blog that it was subjected to a “large” DDoS attack last week that affected customers’ ability to access the site.