Thanks for posting. Its hard to keep up with all the fraud
Thanks for posting. Its hard to keep up with all the fraud
In a 24-hour period last December, an alleged runner named Ming Xue visited 14 Walmarts in Ohio before being arrested, according to court documents. Police said they found 2,260 Visa, Apple and Mastercard gift cards in his car. Xue entered the U.S. illegally months before his arrest, according to a prosecution motion. He has pleaded innocent.
DHS is looking at whether Chinese criminal organizations bring people into the U.S. to use them as card-draining runners. John Cassara, a retired federal agent and the author of “China-Specified Unlawful Activities: CCP Inc., Transnational Crime and Money Laundering,” said Chinese criminal enterprises often smuggle workers across the border for other enterprises such as prostitution or growing marijuana.
This fits Chinese criminal behaviour. Indians will call elderly people and harass them on the phone for hours to get them to buy a single $100.00 gift card. It takes Chinese ingenuity to build software that automatically checks thousands of planted gift cards for balance updates so they can login and steal the money.
* [original link](https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2024/12/gift-card-fraud.html)
* [referenced article](https://www.propublica.org/article/chinese-organized-crime-gift-cards-american-retail)
> In a 24-hour period last December, an alleged runner named Ming Xue visited 14 Walmarts in Ohio before being arrested, according to court documents. Police said they found 2,260 Visa, Apple and Mastercard gift cards in his car. Xue entered the U.S. illegally months before his arrest, according to a prosecution motion. He has pleaded innocent.
>
> DHS is looking at whether Chinese criminal organizations bring people into the U.S. to use them as card-draining runners. John Cassara, a retired federal agent and the author of “China-Specified Unlawful Activities: CCP Inc., Transnational Crime and Money Laundering,” said Chinese criminal enterprises often smuggle workers across the border for other enterprises such as prostitution or growing marijuana.
This fits Chinese criminal behaviour. Indians will call elderly people and harass them on the phone for hours to get them to buy a single $100.00 gift card. It takes Chinese ingenuity to build software that automatically checks thousands of planted gift cards for balance updates so they can login and steal the money.
(post is archived)