CEO Nabbed for Identity Theft From Own Employees 150
BuzzardsBay writes "And you think your boss is a jerk? Check out this VARBusiness story about a tech CEO the feds say was using his employees' personal information to apply for loans and credit cards to the tune of $1 million. Somewhere a whole lot of businesses who bought this guy's managed-services pitch are cringing with the thought of who is taking care of their data now. And 50 employees are gonna have to sweat out their credit reports even as they look for new jobs. Now that's a lousy boss!"
I'm a bit slow (Score:5, Funny)
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http://www.counterpunch.org/cp10202006.html [counterpunch.org]
Re:I'm REAL slow (Score:1)
one or the other (Score:2)
Well, he's either a lousy boss, or a very creative criminal.
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He's an Alchoholic (Score:2)
Doesn't matter (Score:4, Insightful)
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evil CEOs are no worse than dying dotcoms (Score:2)
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I expect I still have my identity no matter what.
But, in all seriousness, I'm not worried about ID theft.
You see, I have already destroyed my creditworthiness completely. It's hardly a risk that someone will take my info and get any kind of loan or credit card based on them.
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You see, I have already destroyed my creditworthiness completely. It's hardly a risk that someone will take my info and get any kind of loan or credit card based on them.
Security through financial obscurity, huh? I can dig it.
What happens if you ever want to actually get a loan, though?
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What about an ID renting business. You have poor credit, no credit or had your ID stolen? No problem, we'll loan you one of ours for a low up front price. You just need to find some folks willing to hand over their info and have your company manage their ID and credit profile. I wonder if credit scores would rise if you suddenly had 1,000-2,000 credit cards and were successfully paying them all off. The bad thing is that I really wouldn't want to try figuring out
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I don't understand. I could probably liquidate part of my gun collection, but I'd have to do that through a FFL dealer, not at a bank. And the one piece I have that's worth more than a thousand bucks, would never fit in a shirt anyway.
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That's not actually a legal requirement (unless I missed something). I've seen firearms for sale by individuals (not FFLs) at flea markets, in newspapers, etc. Is there a law in your state, or is there a new federal law that sales have to go through FFLs?
I actually like this idea. It would do almost nothing to prevent honest citizens from buying and selling guns, but could make it harder for criminals to buy guns. It could also hamper straw-buyers from buyi
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Well, last time I got laughed out of the bank
Ok, I exaggerate a bit. But I am enormously in debt and I don't think I have ever paid a bill on time in my entire life.
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As long as you antic
hmm, I suggest these punishments... (Score:2)
nah, just have an employee meet and greet... (Score:2)
carry the punk CEO into the second conference room etc.
put punk CEO into wheelbarrow for the third room etc.
pour punk CEO into a glass and carry him into the fourth room etc.
and on and on until all the employees have had a chance to hands-on with the punk CEO.
the Department of Justice can provide marshals to escort the punk CEO from room to room. just tell them that the punk CEO had the contract to manage their hea
How did he do it? (Score:2)
social security numbers... (Score:2)
Do you have any common sense? Employers are -required- to have your SS # on file as a course of payroll/taxes.
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But otherwise, everything is perfectly normal (Score:1)
Right.
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Why be an employee? (Score:2)
2. ??? = Work as a subcontracing corporation
3. Profit!!!
(4. -- Don't release ANY legal information to your general contractor)
I've done this for 18 years, and the tax breaks and freedoms are incredible.
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Not in Germany, either. (Score:2)
If the IRS hasn't figured this little trick out, they're kinda slow.
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Oh Boy (Score:1)
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This beats anything he has ever done.
That you know of...yet...
sweat out their credit reports? (Score:3, Interesting)
And 50 employees are gonna have to sweat out their credit reports even as they look for new jobs
Makes you wonder why the courts don't automatically order credit reports of victims cleaned. The burden should NOT be on the victims, even if it is just a matter of sending a letter to the three agencies with a copy of the court docket or similar...
Fun trivia I learned from the manager at my co-op bank branch today: utility (cable, phone, power, gas, etc) companies have been moving towards a new electronic check cashing system ,where your bank never gets the cancelled check back.
Fun, if you need to prove to a credit reporting agency that you DID in fact pay a bill (or a credit line was not listed on your account) since that involves...drumroll please...sending in a copy of the cancelled checks! Likewise for electronic fund transfers and automatic credit card billing. The deck is stacked even further against consumers, just like how you have to pay to get your report if you don't live in certain states...and even if you get the report for free, you don't get your FICO score...
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I do not agree with this mindset. However, it seems to be the American way, Social Darwinism at near it's worst.
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Just... wow.
You're an employer and (Score:2)
A company putting claims of stuff you stole on a credit report is bullshit - how do you know it's even true? It's a CLAIM, it's not truth, it's not a conviction in a court of law. Any company that puts these things on a credit report is full of shit - if you defrauded a company then take them to court. Chicken shits libel people via credit reports and then use million dollar attorneys to dare them to sue
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You're claiming that someone failing to pay a hospital bill is a thief. That's really good. I don't even need to debate this with you, anonymous coward... you're just a retard.
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Legislation was passed years ago (Check21) that allows for check imaging to be used as a permanent, legal record of the transaction.
This doesn't explain why the slow-ass banks still take three days to clear your check. We have lightning fast systems and the appropriate legislation, and they are still sitting on your money. Actually, I can explain it: because it benefits them. Unfortunately, Check21 puts very few responsibilities on the banks. Th
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Do it to too many and you could be in jail for a very long time sending letters and making phone calls.
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Do you know what a FICO score is? It is a measure of credit worthiness designed by a company based on statistics and probability. It is the product that is sold by a company, the Fair Isaac Corporation. It is the opinion of that company how likely you are to pay back a loan. Why do you feel you
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Because they are THE company that pretty much everyone turns to for determining this information and you, as a single person, have virtually no recourse against them if their d
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There's all these gray areas about what is or should be public knowledge and what is wrong with someone sharing what is already in the public domain. Why is it a freedom of speech issue for 'Online Tech Magazine' to be able to review motherboards and tell the world that they suck..but when the company that makes the motherboard turns around and reviews the reviewer, showing everyone the PUBLIC records of the multiple fraud convict
Massive Installation? (Score:3, Funny)
What is this? One midrange disk array?
I bet if the editor walked into their datacenter they'd find more than 40TB...
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You're right. Criminy, I've got about 10% of this much space on home file servers. 40TB was big 10 or maybe even 5 years ago. Not today, it isn't.
Granted, a terabyte on enterprise class hardware costs a bit more than consumer grade stuff, but still. The little newspaper I work for has almost that much in one chassis in one rack.
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Is varbusiness.com a porno site?
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Well, that's only $28/GB which isn't too far off once you get into high-level hardware, 20% net utilization (dual RAID-10 arrays plus hot spares), SCSI drives that were probably built a few years ago (36/72GB disks with a higher $/GB), backups, the SAN hardware, etc.
Even a low-end SATA storage unit runs about $2-$3/GB. And with SCSI drives you're typically looking at $6-$8/GB at the low-end with it being pretty easy to get up into the $15/GB range once you include stuff like backups
well at least that solves the old problem: (Score:2)
2. ???
3. profit!
at least we know what the ??? is now
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1. Start tech company.
2. Hire lots of employees.
3. ??? 4. Profit!!!
5. Hire more employees.
6. Steal their identity.
7. Profit!!!
8. ???
9. Go to jail. Do not pass go. Do not collect $200.
Not only did they have products and services to profit from. This guy squeezed $1 million out of his overhead!
This reminds me, for some odd reason... (Score:2)
Anybody know whatever happened to Scott Draeker? (Or the employee whose credit card was used to make payroll?...)
Still think so (Score:1, Troll)
(I'm definitely kidding. Got 2 of the best bosses I've ever had just at the moment. And they don't even read slashdot, so this isn't just a suck up).
i dont believe it (Score:1)
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Except that's not a word. :)
Come to that, neither is the one before it.
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For your years of great service (Score:1)
Put this in your pipe and smoke it! (Score:1)
The name should've given it away (Score:1)
tell a Chalk from Cheese
Tagging gets rather pornographic (Score:2)
javascript:tagsOpenAndEnter('06:11:02:0122215', 'asshole','')
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Do they own the company now? (Score:2)
Re:It's not what you signed up for, that's for sur (Score:2)
I have a dream about going to the Bahamas for 5 months and living a life of luxury. I figure I need about $500K to do this. It's ok if I rob a bank to finance this, then? I figure a bank is a "different cash reserve".
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Re:It's not what you signed up for, that's for sur (Score:5, Insightful)
He isn't the one that gets to make such calls. He deserves no leniency for his actions. If he had actually made the company successful, it still wouldn't excuse him. If he had a good idea, then he should have been able to get money to finance it. If he couldn't convince people that his ideas were solid and that they would get a return on their money, then he didn't deserve to be running the company. He's like every other schmuck out there that can't launch whatever idea he has. It doesn't give anyone the right, the obligation, or the duty to commit crimes in order to finance their business.
If anything, crimes like these need to have more severe penalties. There's far too much identity theft going on. Anyone caught doing it should be severely punished. White-collar crime in general should be punished much more severely than it is now, if only because it's so hard to build the cases in the first place. It's the same logic they're using for giving out harsh penalties for file-sharers. If the chances of getting caught are low, then the punishment must be more severe to have the desired deterrent effect.
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I understand that. But when we start discussing crimes of theft of identity or fraud on a large scale, you have to also consider the impact it has on others. Looking at Enron, the fraud that they perpetrated caused financial ruin for a lot of their employees and others as well. That deserves a MUCH greater pu
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I am willing to bet that the money was NOT "earmarked" for "business purposes" by these people, umm what do you call them again, oh yeah, the actual OWNERS of the money. This is theft, plain and simple.
You're trying to say that the end justifies the means. All I did was give you a different "end" to point out the flaw in your argument. According to you: if I ki
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Re:It's not what you signed up for, that's for sur (Score:1)
Re:It's not what you signed up for, that's for sur (Score:2)
I figure either the person in question is either a sociopath or just plain incompetent. Because when a CEO has to resort to such tactics, he/she has already failed to do their job...
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By all means, throw the guy in jail. What he did was wholly illegal and unethical. However that doesn't solve any problem. Would it not be more prudent to both improve access to capital and provide a minimum level of protection for those hurt by identity fraud?
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From reading your posts, you should be joining him in whatever punishment he does receive. Those that rationalize evil are worse than those that do it.
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Re:It's not what you signed up for, that's for sur (Score:4, Insightful)
You know, this is really taking the whole victim mentality to the next level of insanity. "It's not his fault really, society forced him to because no one would loan him money." Give me a break!
Theft is wrong. Stealing from your employees is NEVER excusable. Please don't ask me to have sympathy for the crook. Corporations have a myriad of ways to legally screw employees without having to resort to outright theft.
You know, there are some things in the world that really are black or white, right or wrong. This is one of them. Please stop turning everything gray.
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I don't know
Re:It's not what you signed up for, that's for sur (Score:2)
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If I knew who you were, and that you had a position of authority with any company I would submit your name to the local authorities for investigation.
I would also submit your information to your companies accountants and list of some ethical concerns.
There is absolutely no justification for committing fraud (which is what this is) against employees, merely to stay in business.
If a company ends up in that position it may wish to ASK the employees to support the company, but you can't require it!
based on your
Re:It's not what you signed up for, that's for sur (Score:2)
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This reminds me of when I worked for a Fortune 500 company some years back. The manager of my location *routinely* shaved time off of employee time cards in order to make his wage budget. But this guy would routinely have thieving employees arrested AND would manage to work up a big load of righteous indignation.
Re:It's not what you signed up for, that's for sur (Score:2)
Re:It's not what you signed up for, that's for sur (Score:2)
Re:It's not what you signed up for, that's for sur (Score:2)
This is why I stopped looking for investors and folded my company.
Re:It's not what you signed up for, that's for sur (Score:2)
Wow, is that a troll? If no, please provide me with your name, social security number, address and sample of your signature.
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But when a system is not re-arranging capital based on a person's ability to impress investors/lendors on the merits of a business plan and other positive things - and is instead risking capital because, essentially, everyone who asks for it gets it (from where, I wonder?)... well, that's socialized business investment/lending.
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Ah! I see. And if the guarantee is proving a little hard to deliver, that's when millions of starving workers get slaughtered (a, Stalin, what a gem he was - or that fabulous cultural revolution in China - nothing but guarantees, that was!) or the less "able"
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OK then: show me a nice, rosy, socialist system that would still be providing anything like a workable standard of living if it didn't enormously tax the productivity of people who run the engine of the economy by being capitalists. Such countries live off of their capitalist-minded productivit
I'm European (Score:2)
Actually, it's the workers (Score:2)
We make this country, and the CEOs are just parasites who tell us what to do and often get it wrong.
America doesn't need CEOs, and most certainly we do not need corporate personhood.
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Hey, the Coward family has been plagued by their name for years. They thought they were doing the son a favor by naming him "Anonymous".