Irina Ivanova reports: Most people trust their accountant. But security breaches at accounting firms and legal firms are contributing to the plethora of tax information available at rock-bottom prices online, according to a cybersecurity executive. These documents—which include prior years’ tax returns and forged W-2s—can now be had for rock-bottom prices, according to a report…
Category: ID Theft
Three Romanian citizens plead guilty to participating in a multi-million dollar “vishing and smishing” scheme
ATLANTA – Robert Codrut Dumitrescu pleaded guilty to federal charges of wire fraud conspiracy, computer fraud and abuse, and aggravated identity theft in connection with a scheme, orchestrated from Romania, which resulted in the illegal intrusion into computer servers in the United States, deployment of phishing messages to thousands of victims, and subsequent theft of…
New charges filed in HIV data leak
Whitney Leggett reports: A Winchester man charged in Singapore with leaking the confidential information of more than 14,000 HIV patients is facing new federal charges in Kentucky. Mikhy Farrera-Brochez, 34, was arrested in Clark County December and charged with third-degree criminal trespassing for allegedly refusing to leave his mother’s property. According to court documents, it…
Child identity theft on the rise
Jordan Berger reports: At least 1 million children were impacted by identity theft in the past year. A 2018 study conducted by Javelin found the identity fraud resulted in more than $2.6 billion in total losses, and over $540 million in out-of-pocket costs to families. Jeff Pitts, a public information officer with the Columbia Police…
Japenese Payment Card Fraud Contrasts with Regional Patterns – Gemini Advisory
Stas Alforov writes: Based on the proprietary Gemini Advisory telemetry data collected from various dark web sources over several years, we have determined that in 2018, nearly 1.4 million cards were compromised in the East Asia region, nearly a 100% increase from 2017. Despite the overarching trend of increased fraud in East Asia, Japanese compromised…
Laplace Woman Charged with Stealing Federal Student Aid Funds and Identity Theft
From the press release: United States Attorney Peter G. Strasser announced that KENDRA GRAVES, age 31, was charged on January 31, 2019 in a two-count bill of information with theft of government funds, in violation of Title 18, United States Code, Section 641 and identity theft in violation of Title 18, United States Code, Section…