Threats Without Borders - Issue 132
Cyber-Financial Investigation Newsletter, Week ending May 28, 2023
I trust everyone enjoyed the long weekend and took a few minutes to remember why the holiday exists.
The weather cooperated here in Central Pennsylvania and I was able to spend more time outside than inside - not in front of a keyboard. I have a nice follow-up to last weeks main post (discussing IP addresses) but it’s only half done… because I was outside and not shut in the house. See how this is all related?
Rest assured, this issue will yield the highest open numbers in months. It never fails that the newsletter has its highest viewership when I shitpost.
So please, if this is your first time reading Threats Without Borders, come back next week.
As a penance, I present this insightful article discussing the difference between Scotch and Bourbon, published in Good Housekeeping magazine no less. Who knew?
https://www.goodhousekeeping.com/food-recipes/cooking/a43878420/scotch-vs-whiskey/
It’s your fault. NO, it’s your fault! NO…
You can’t fault the victim in this case because these scammers are getting so sophisticated that it’s very difficult to keep up, BUT I’m not sure the bank is responsible either. This lady fell for a scam that started with a text message and ended up with her account being drained of all 160,000 dollars. She says Chase Bank is to blame and should repay her for the loss. The authors of the article interviewed a CFE who agrees that Chase is at fault. I’ve never been interviewed by Yahoo News so I’ll defer to him. But whats the endgame in holding the financial institutions responsible for every poor choice made by their customers? https://www.yahoo.com/news/scammers-using-text-messages-drain-143348905.html
That’s a lot of calls
Who knew there is a task force of 51 attorney generals (they included D.C. for good measure) called the “Anti-Robocall Multistate Litigation Task Force”? Yes, it does exist, and Yes, they are doing good work. In fact, they just filed a lawsuit against a telecommunications company that blasted us with more than 7.5 billion robocalls. The lawsuit alleges the company spoofed phone numbers to make it look like the calls were coming from government and law enforcement sources. Hopefully, those responsible aren’t permitted to just pay a fine and walk away. Twenty-years in prison would be fitting a remedy. https://www.pennlive.com/nation-world/2023/05/company-sued-over-billions-of-robocalls-to-people-on-do-not-call-list.html
If a tree falls in a forest…
If a casino gets scammed…is it really a scam? Or was the fox just outfoxed? This guy came up with a method that allowed him to “exploit the asymmetry of the pattern on the back of the cards”. There was a lot more to it but the end result was a 10 million dollar loss to the casino. https://abcnews.go.com/US/inside-card-trick-alleged-10-million-casino-scam/story?id=44300467
Collaborators of enemy
Everyone agrees we should fight to disrupt money laundering. Only few people believe we should completely ban cryptocurrency. Elizabeth Warren and other politicians want to ban cryptocurrency, but know there isn’t the supports for it. So they created a measure to effectively ban crypto disguised as a measure to fight money laundering. A trojan horse some may say. https://www.coindesk.com/consensus-magazine/2023/05/18/elizabeth-warrens-bill-wont-stop-money-laundering-but-it-could-ban-crypto/
Unsolvable?
Scott Shapiro asks, and attempts to answer, the question: Is cybersecurity an unsolvable problem? https://arstechnica.com/features/2023/05/is-cybersecurity-an-unsolvable-problem/
Cool Tool
Search the Internet by face. https://facecheck.id/
Is this a legitimate email? Is it risky? How old is it? https://emailrep.io/
Cool Job
Chief Anti-Money Laundering Officer. Edward Jones. (remote option) https://careers.edwardjones.com/job/18422219/chief-anti-money-laundering-officer-saint-louis-mo/
Irrelevant
Let Ryan Holliday teach you some things about money. https://ryanholiday.net/31-lessons-ive-learned-about-money/
Damn bias’s
Non-adaptive choice switching - Occurs after experiencing a bad outcome with a decision problem, the tendancy to avoid the choice previously made when faced with the same decision problem again, even though the choice was optimal. Most of us know that is as the “one bitten, twice shy” effect.
Thank you for reading this edition of the newsletter, even though it was lacking substance. It’s rare when central Pennsylvania has four days of near-perfect weather and I took full advantage of it. Although I did sit inside to watch some sports.
Go Bears!
Matt
“YOUR FUTURE SELF IS WATCHING YOU RIGHT NOW THROUGH YOUR MEMORIES.” - I found this more profound than I should admit. It’s so simple but very provoking. I need to explore it more.