Goodizen :: Scams

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - The U.S. Coast Guard halted its search off northern California on Tuesday for a crippled sailboat and four people reported to have abandoned the vessel, and investigators also were looking into whether the distress call received two days ago was a hoax. The search operation, suspended as of 9:30 a.m. local time, had covered an area the size of West Virginia but found no signs of the boat or of two adults and two children who were presumed missing since Sunday, Coast Guard spokesman Thomas McKenzie said. The Coast Guard began scanning the frigid, choppy coastal waters from Half Moon Bay south to Monterey with search vessels and aircraft after receiving a radio message on Sunday afternoon saying a 29-foot sailboat was disabled and taking on water about 65 miles off Point Pillar. A little more than an hour after the initial distress call, a man identifying himself as the vessel's operator radioed that the four people aboard were abandoning the craft...

Coast Guard counts 54 probable hoaxes nationwide in 2011 Reward of $ 3,000 still stands in last June's hoax off the New Jersey coast Navy and Air National Guard participate in the California coast search "We're not investigating it directly as a hoax. ... It's certainly a possibility," official says San Francisco (CNN) -- The U.S. Coast Guard is suspending its search off the California coast for a distressed 29-foot sailboat that was carrying a couple and two children, and said Tuesday the incident is "possibly a hoax." The mission's cost has reached several hundreds of thousands of dollars since Sunday, said Cmdr. Don Montoro. Searchers have been scouring the water off San Francisco for the people that a distress call claimed were on the boat: the couple, their 4-year-old child and the child's cousin, who the Coast Guard said was younger than 8. Coast Guard investigators will look into the incident and "p...

SANTA CRUZ, Calif. (AP) — The Pacific Ocean either swallowed an adventurous couple and two young children aboard a sailboat off the Monterey coast this week, or someone played a cruel hoax that wasted Coast Guard resources and tugged at the hearts of coastal residents over two days of desperate searching. The Coast Guard on Tuesday called off the search for a boat that reportedly sank in rough seas far off the Central California coast , saying nothing more could be done and that the family's distress calls might have been a hoax. "We've exhausted the possibilities," Coast Guard Chief Petty Officer Mike Lutz said. The Coast Guard is treating the incident as a rescue, with the possibility the calls came from a trickster. Neither the family nor the boat has been reported missing. Crews started looking for the family by sea and air after receiving their first distress call Sunday afternoon, when the boaters said their 29-foot sailboat was taking on water and ...

25 February 2013 Last updated at 17:07 ET Scene of alert on Cavehill Road Army bomb disposal officers have carried out a controlled explosion on a bomb that was found close to a police station in north Belfast. It was discovered near the back of Antrim Road PSNI station on Cavehill Road on Monday evening. About 35 houses in the area were evacuated and the Cavehill Road was closed between the Antrim Road and Willowbrook Gardens during the alert. Police said it was a small device and the operation has been scaled down. Read More @ Source National Lampoon - Deteriorata (National Lampoon Radio Dinner (1972)) National Lampoon Radio Dinner is a comedy album from National Lampoon that was first released in 1972. The humor on the album was very much steeped in the pop culture of the era and includes such subjects as game shows ("Catch It and You Keep"), the 1972 presidential election ("Profiles in Chrome" ...

by Kyle Iboshi, KGW News kgw.com Posted on February 25, 2013 at 5:14 PM Updated today at 5:17 PM ALBANY, Ore. -- An Albany woman and her daughter will have to pay back thousands of dollars after an elaborate scheme to rip off soft drink giant Coca Cola. Police say the duo figured out a way to manipulate a bottle cap promotion and collect more than $ 200,000. It's a game many who consume soft drinks are familiar with. Beneath the cap of the soda bottle, there is a code. You go onto a website to find out if you've won. And in most cases, you don't. But according to police, an Albany woman and her daughter figured out a way to cheat and they won, time after time after time. On Friday, 55-year old Carrie Jones and 31-year old Sarah Jones pleaded guilty to computer crime. Coca Cola investigators got suspicious in 2011 after tracking an unusually high number of winnings to a computer IP address in Albany. Police say the suspects sold their contest p...

With the Falcons director of personnel Lionel Vital intently watching on, former Notre Dame linebacker Manti Te'o addressed the embarrassing internet hoax at the NFL scouting combine Saturday at Lucas Oil Stadium. Vital is second in command to general manger Thomas Dimitroff, who said that the team would interview Te'o. The Falcons wanted to see how Te'o handled the interview, which lasted 14 minutes, 24 seconds. Te'o stated that he wanted to talk about football, but opened up as the interview progressed. "I'm just very grateful to those who helped me get through that time," said Te'o, who's considered one of the top inside linebacker prospects in the draft. "I think it went as smoothly as it could." Te'o is projected to be selected in the first round, but doesn't know if the girl friend hoax will hurt his draft status. He's already interviewed with Houston and Green Bay. "They all just wanted to hear from m...

Updated Feb 23, 2013 4:54 PM ET Former Notre Dame linebacker Manti Te'o addressed a room full of reporters at the NFL Scouting Combine on Saturday and talked about the "embarrassment" he has felt after being lured into an elaborate "catfishing" hoax that drew tons of media attention in early January. CIRCLE THE DATE Now that the regular season is over, here's what NFL fans have to look forward to. Te'o faced a throng of reporters for nearly 20 minutes following a two-hour delay because of visits with doctors. He gave quick, concise answers on the hoaxing topic, but made it known that he "said all [he] needed to say and that [he's] focused on football." Until this point, Te'o has given only a couple interviews since acknowledging he was a victim of a thorough online relationship with Lennay Kekua, a nonexistent woman, created by Ronaiah Tuiasosopo. The Heisman Trophy finalist faced a flurry o...

  Twitter exploded Saturday morning after a gunman wearing body armor was reportedly spotted on the MIT campus, which is terrifying considering the year the U.S. has gone through. What's even more terrifying is that it appears it was a hoax.  RELATED: Mark Davidson's Twitter Hijacking by Ghostwriters Was a Hoax So, from what we can gather, Cambridge police received a report around 7:30 a.m. Saturday morning of a gunman on MIT 's campus and dispatched "all available" units. The school went into lockdown mode. The school's website automatically redirected to this emergency warning page: This morning information was received from Cambridge Police that there was a person with a long rifle and body armor in the Main Group Building of MIT.  Multiple law enforcement agencies have responded. Stay indoors and shelter in place and report suspicious activity to the campus police dispatch at 617 253 1212 or dial 100 from a campus phone.  More updates to f...

All the controversy about Manti Te'o's position in a bizarre hoax apparently hasn't diminished NFL interest in the star Notre Dame linebacker who was a finalist for the Heisman Trophy. Te'o told reporters at the NFL Scouting Combine today that he has already met with two teams and has interviews scheduled with 18 more. Neither team seemed especially intested in the hoax that captured so much media attention, he said. Appearing relaxed but eager to put the scandal behind him, Te'o told reporters that the chaos surrounding the hoax was occasionally "overwhelming" for him and his family. "It's definitely embarrassing," Te'o said of the scandal. "You walk into grocery stores and you get double-takes." Te'o, 21, has been dealing with intense scrutiny from the press and public after it was revealed that his girlfriend Lennay Kekua, who supposedly had died of leukemia last fall, actually never existed. ...

LAS VEGAS (KSNV MyNews3) -- We often hear from the people who have been victimized by scam artists. But, rarely do we hear from the criminals themselves. In today's Rip-Off Alert is the story of one woman's road to redemption. "I had a problem with drugs and as my addiction grew as my money and necessity grew," Mary said. "I heard about people stealing mail and making counterfeit checks." Mary says with stolen account information, she would print up fake checks and ID cards to match. Getting the information was easy. "Through stealing mail, through bank Dumpsters, through garbage behind car loan places. Places like that may have your information and then throw it away," Mary said. Mary says on a slow day she would cash $ 500 in counterfeit checks; a good day $ 2,000. In all, 250 victims were scammed out of almost $ 50,000. "We said we would get to a certain amount of money and we would stop," Mary said. "But it never seemed we ...

There's a press release making the rounds on the internet this afternoon saying that London police have arrested famed graffiti artist Banksy and revealed his identity. Don't believe it  — the whole thing seems to be a hoax. We just placed a call to London's Metropolitan Police, who confirmed that the Banksy is still safely under cover. And there are no reports about the alleged arrest on BBC or CNN, which both supposedly covered the story according to the press release on PRLog. Tellingly, the contact address for the release is an email address at the domain name www.iywib.com , a humor site (it's currently down). We have to give the writer some credit, though — the details in the press release are pretty specific. It claims that Banksy is Paul William Horner, a 39-year old male born in Bristol, England. And it says that he's "currently being held without bail on charges of vandalism, conspiracy, racketeering and counterfeiting." While...

advertisement Fire crews sent on hoax call in Southcote By Natasha Adkins February 22, 2013 Two fire crews were sent on a wild goose chase by a hoax call in Southcote today. A call from a pay phone reporting a house fire in Maker Close at 11.47am sent crews from Dee Road and Caversham Road fire stations to the alleged site, where it was discovered the call was bogus. Ellie Gray, a spokeswoman for the Royal Berkshire Fire and Rescue Service (RBFRS), said: "Hoax calls cause disruption and unnecessarily tie up fire resources, people shouldn't do it." RBFRS have a hoax call challenge policy, this allows any operator who has reason to suspect that a hoax call is being made, they will challenge the caller by informing them that the call is being recorded and that police may be informed. If a hoax call is made from a mobile phone, control operators can send text messages warning that any future hoax calls will be reported to the Police.  Read More...

A new Facebook hoax that's circulating around the network suggests that users need to upgrade to a "Gold" level membership status in order to avoid having their private info leaked for all to see. Hoax-Slayer first spotted the hoax. Here's the message that some users are seeing: It's official. Communication media. FACEBOOK has just published its price. fee of $ ? ($ 9.99), to become a member of "gold" and keep your privacy as it is. If you paste this on your wall will be completely free. Otherwise, tomorrow all your documents can become public. Even those messages that you have deleted or photos that you have not authorized …… not cost you anything, copy and paste Of course, there's the part at the end about simply sharing the status in order to make all the problems go away. That's the number one mechanism that scammers use to spread viral hoaxes on any social network – because how hard is it to just copy and paste it, you kno...

The NFL scouting combine is coming up, and Notre Dame linebacker Manti Te'o has the opportunity to make his infamous hoax a distant memory. Shortly after the BCS Championship Game, which his Fighting Irish lost to Alabama 42-14, it was revealed that Te'o 's allegedly deceased girlfriend, Lennay Kekua , was not actually real and that the story of her death and their relationship was a hoax. Rather, it was the workings of a man by the name of Ronaiah Tuiasosopo . Te'o claimed to be the victim of a prank gone bad, but it did not stop the media from giving him a ton of unwanted and negative attention. Of course, his draft stock went from being a surefire first-round pick to highly uncertain. Fortunately, Te'o now has the opportunity to use the combine to show scouts just why they fell in love with him in the first place. Whether he was involved in the Lennay Kekua hoax or not, it does not take away from the fact that he is an excellent linebacker with...

The malware often has an official-looking reference to police and cyber-crime. (istock) The Canadian Anti-Fraud Centre is warning people about a 'scareware' scam that locks up your computer, displaying a message that says it has been linked to child pornography. The message tells users that the only fix is to send $ 100 to the RCMP, (or in some cases CSIS), as a fine. "No police would squeeze money out of people in this way," said Daniel Williams, a supervisor with the Canadian Anti-Fraud Centre. 'Most certainly as the sun is going to shine tomorrow, scammers don't continue if they don't make money' —Daniel Williams, Canadian Anti-Fraud Centre Williams said the malware scam appears to have originated with gangs in the former Soviet Union and was popular in the United Kingdom several years ago before coming to Canada. "Malware is planted here, there and everywhere on the internet," he said. "They tailor the warning to t...

BRADENTON, Fla. (AP) -- Manti Te'o told USA Today on Monday that he doesn't believe the online hoax that fooled him will affect his stock in the upcoming NFL draft. The former Notre Dame linebacker also said he has shut down his Twitter account and isn't sure if he will ever use social media again. Te'o has only granted a couple of interviews since he acknowledged falling in love with a nonexistent woman invented by another man who insists the runner-up for the Heisman Trophy was unaware of the scam during the online relationship. The NFL combine begins Wednesday in Indianapolis, and Te'o is certain to face a lot of questions from teams wanting to know more about how he was drawn into the bizarre hoax that made national headlines. ''I have to just go out there and perform and all that other stuff is behind me,'' he told USA Today. ''What I did on the field is what I did on the field. I don't think what I did with this whole si...

BRADENTON, Fla. (AP) -- Manti Te'o told USA Today on Monday that he doesn't believe the online hoax that fooled him will affect his stock in the upcoming NFL draft. The former Notre Dame linebacker also said he has shut down his Twitter account and isn't sure if he will ever use social media again. Te'o has only granted a couple of interviews since he acknowledged falling in love with a nonexistent woman invented by another man who insists the runner-up for the Heisman Trophy was unaware of the scam during the online relationship. The NFL combine begins Wednesday in Indianapolis, and Te'o is certain to face a lot of questions from teams wanting to know more about how he was drawn into the bizarre hoax that made national headlines. ''I have to just go out there and perform and all that other stuff is behind me,'' he told USA Today. ''What I did on the field is what I did on the field. I don't think what I did with this whole si...

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