Facebook removed 690 million fake accounts between October and December 2023

By their own admission, Meta, the owners of Facebook say they 'actioned' (believed to mean removed) 690 million fake accounts that were started between October and December 2023. Ninety-nine percent of them were discovered before they had been reported.

Note: Always be cautious when using Facebook and Instagram. Think the worst and proceed from that starting point. Too many scammers. Never send money upfront. Never.

Their response with this information was to the revelation that Meta is failing to do enough for 'romance fraud' victims. The Times report that there has been a 29% rise in the number of scams against victims who believed that they were communicating with an attractive man (or the other way around but less likely) when in fact they were communicating with a scammer who was using the image of a man who had no idea that his image was being used in this way.

Dr Christian Boving is used by love scammers to extract money from unsuspecting women looking for love. He is gay. He knows about the problem and has reported it to Meta, Facebook's owner but nothing happened. Image: The Times newspaper.

As an example, The Times reports on the picture of a Danish hunk of a doctor (who by the way is gay), Dr. Christian Boving, that has been used multiple times by scammers to develop relationships online through Facebook with unsuspecting women with the intention of, when the time is right, scamming the women out of thousands of pounds.

One such woman is Lauren McEwan, living in Missouri, USA. She was attracted to Dr. Christian Boving's face. But she was communicating with somebody else. These scams are called "authorised push payment frauds". The customers are tricked into paying money to an account controlled by a criminal. And Meta is facilitating these crimes it is alleged.

McEwan said that her experience hurt. She said that: "It did hurt. It was a real let down. It took me a couple of weeks to come to terms with it."

The report says that she is one of several new victims to have chosen to speak out about their experiences with Boving impersonators.

The accusation against Meta is that they have failed to clamp down on fake accounts using this doctor's appearance.

His face has appeared on various social media websites as part of scams and dating apps but the problem is particularly bad for Facebook. The doctor has accused Meta of continuously failing to delete the fakes. He wants more stringent verification to prevent the scam accounts being created.

Fraudsters began to use his picture 10 years ago. But the number of fake accounts have surged in recent years. He is speaking out against the problem to try and stop it. Victims have been alerted but many of these fake profiles remain online. He has lost hope and thinks that it will never stop.

He emailed Meta with a long list of fake profiles. He said that they weren't removed after he reported them. The Times newspaper also sent the list to Meta and some of the profiles have remained active. They had a partial success I guess because of their increased clout. But it is remarkable that Meta are still slow and reluctant to deal with these problems.

These are romance scam operations. Sometimes the women (it is usually women I guess) realise that there's something strange going on but they enjoy the admiration and the kind words. Sometimes when it's been proved unequivocally to the victim that they are being scammed they still refuse to accept it remarkably.

Meta says that accounts impersonating someone else are against their rules. They said that they have removed a number of accounts reported to them and continue to investigate. They don't allow fraudulent activity and they work with law enforcement to prevent the scammers using their platforms.

And, they admit that between October and December last year they took action on more than 690 million fake accounts on Facebook. Amazing. It gives the impression that Facebook is plagued, swamped, drowning in fake accounts.

Meta encourage people to report what they believe to be scamming accounts by using its in-app tools.

Nick Clegg

Nick Clegg was a British politician until he joined Facebook on a $15 million a year salary a few years ago! Also in The Times there's an article about him, describing him as the Machiavelli of Meta. They ask whether he is curbing big tech excesses or enabling them.

The journalist who wrote that article, Tom McTague, writes that, "with [Meta's] platforms a hub for crime, from fraud to child grooming, any claims he is making it more responsible ring hollow." 

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P.S. please forgive the occasional typo. These articles are written at breakneck speed using Dragon Dictate. I have to prepare them in around 20 mins.

You have a one-in-three chance of being scammed when buying from Facebook Marketplace

Facebook Marketplace accounts for 73% of all purchase fraud cases at one British bank. TSB, a British bank, claims that more than one third of adverts on Facebook Marketplace are scams and consumers should avoid making purchases on that website.

TSB Bank added that Facebook Marketplace accounted for 73% of all purchase fraud cases and was the biggest driver of fraud by volume, as reported by The Times today Thursday, January 18, 2024.

Comment: I am flabbergasted because this is a very high percentage. I've just visited Facebook Marketplace to have a look at it for the first time and it looks perfectly normal with lots of free items by the way. Scams?

TSB Bank also calculated that £60 million ($76m) might have been lost by customers from all the banks using Marketplace in 2023. This would equate to £160,000 scammed every day on this Facebook platform.

The fraud spokesman at TSB, Matt Hepburn said: 

"You wouldn't shop at a supermarket if a third of the items were stale or counterfeit, so the same should apply to Facebook Marketplace, where you have a one-in-three chance of being scammed when paying online. Social media companies must act on their commitments under the Online Fraud Charter by urgently clearing up their platforms. Removing scam adverts is a good first test."

A TSB fraud team tested Facebook Marketplace. They contacted the sellers and concluded that 34% of the listings were fraudulent.

These allegedly fraudulent sellers used tactics such as:

• directing the buyer to fake websites and
• refusing to allow viewings of an item in person and
• demanding fees in advance.

Warning: nobody under any circumstances should send money in advance unless you are absolutely sure that the business or person you are dealing with is genuinely bona fide i.e. is behaving scrupulously and with integrity.

Example: a Ninja Air Fryer for sale on Facebook Marketplace was listed as brand-new at £65. The genuine retail price of the item is £249. Buyers were redirected to a fake website when they clicked on the link to purchase this product.

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P.S. please forgive the occasional typo. These articles are written at breakneck speed using Dragon Dictate. I have to prepare them in around 20 mins.

Warning to UK residents: scams demanding upfront fees have soared by 550%

NEWS AND VIEWS: This is a warning to UK residents and I would like to point out that a lot of people buy cats online nowadays from social media for example and not infrequently these sellers ask for money upfront perhaps in a deposit. Then the buyer never hears from the seller again. That is the kind of scam that this article refers to. But it covers a whole host of different products and commercial transactions.

Upfront fee scams increase in the UK. Image: MikeB

The Times reports that, "Scams that ask people to pay an upfront fee for fake goods or services have soared sixfold since Covid-19 but overall fraud has fallen back to pre-pandemic levels".

The Office for National Statistics said that there were 391,000 advance fee fraud offences committed in the 12 months to March 2023 which is the equivalent of 1071 every day or 44 per hour!

This was a 541% increase on the 60,000 advance fee fraud offences committed in the same period running up to March 2020. This is the time when Covid-19 lockdown restrictions were first introduced.

Advanced fraud fee scammers seek to entice eager buyers to send money online in advance of receiving the goods or services. The basic advice is to NEVER PAY MONEY UPFRONT. Unless you absolutely no for sure that the person you are sending the money to is reliable and honest. That's unlikely to be the case. Personally, I would never give anybody money upfront for goods or services.

If anybody asks you for money upfront particular on social media you immediately presume that they are scammers. That might sound a little aggressive and cynical but it is good advice.

As mentioned, there have been numerous scams of this nature concerning the purchase of kittens online. Sometimes the scam is compounded by the seller purporting to sell a purebred cat such as the popular Maine Coon. You send the money to reserve a kitten and at that point the seller disappears. They never communicate again and you never see your kitten.

Never buy a purebred cat online without seeing the kitten first at the seller's property. Just don't do it in my view. Unless, once again, you can verify that the seller is bone fide and therefore honest and genuine.

The world is becoming more dangerous. There are more scammers around these days. Particularly in the UK. Scammers think that the UK is "treasure island". It is because there are too many silly people falling for these scams. We all have to be super-vigilant all the time. And we are alone because the police do nothing about online fraud. They are totally out of their depth.

British police officer sold sick and dying kittens in a cruel £280,000 moneymaking scam

NEWS AND OPINION: In another example of British police officers misbehaving, former British Transport Police officer Amy Byrne and her partner Harry Angell bought kittens at a discounted price and apparently, they also bred kittens as well and then sold them at inflated prices. 

I will suggest here that the reason they were able to sell the sick kittens at inflated prices is because they claimed that they were purebred kittens. This has not been reported in the news media but if you can buy kittens for £50 online which you can and then sell them for hundreds of pounds which you also can you have to justify it by misrepresenting the kittens as purebred. 

A lot of people are fooled by claims that cats are purebred, pedigree cats. They don't know the cat breeds or what they should look like. The wool can be pulled over their eyes. You see a lot of this online. In truth this couple's scam was based on this weakness in knowledge.

One of the sick kittens. Image: SWNS/RSPCA

In this moneymaking scam, the health and welfare of the kittens concerned were completely ignored. Customers often found that their new pets were malnourished, ill and even covered in urine or faeces. They sometimes died not long after they were adopted. This is after the family had bonded to the kitten which makes this go even more obnoxious because it wasn't only the kittens who suffered but the people who bought them as well.

This scamming couple used at least 33 fake identities in adverts. Remember, this is a police officer. She was engaging in out-and-out crime. Another example by the way of a failure in the selection process for police officers. This has been admitted by the head of the Metropolitan Police. Although Amie Byrne worked for the British Transport Police as mentioned.

The couple deceived buyers into believing that they were buying kittens that had been wormed and micro-chipped. They provided fake health certificates.

They pleaded guilty at Woolwich Crown Court to charges of fraud and breaches of the Animal Welfare Act 2006. Angell was jailed for three years and four months while Byrne was jailed for three years and eight months. They were both banned from owning pets for 10 years with no chance of an appeal.

The RSPCA prosecuted. Representing that charity at court, Hazel Stevens gave six examples where kittens died soon after they were bought. She said:

There were human and animal victims in this. Humans were at risk of getting illnesses from the cats. Children were excited about a new member of the family including one child who made a card to thank Amy Byrne only to see them died days later.

One parent bought a male kitten for her artistic son. She soon found that the cat was in fact female and was underweight and had diarrhoea in her fur. She died soon afterwards.

One victim said:

Having recently lost a cat, we were so looking forward to giving a home to a new kitten. We instantly fell in love with Elsa, who was so sleepy and cuddly when we got her. For the two precious weeks we had her she became part of our family. We were devastated to watch her slowly go downhill, trying to rid her of the worms she arrived with and taking her to the vet for numerous tests. She spent the last two days in the animal hospital with them trying everything to make a better but she gave up the fight.

Think of the emotional pain of that and the pain suffered by the kitten. And also think of the financial cost.

When purchasers contacted the couple, they were ignored. Trading Standards and the RSPCA were inundated with complaints leading to the police searching the home of Byrne and Angell. They tried to throw away their mobile phones. Angell jumped out of the window and threw his phone in the garden. Byrne did a factory reset on her phone.

Despite these attempts to remove data, Angell's phone was recovered which revealed hundreds of images of kittens. There were also enquiries about adverts and complaints from customers on the phone.

The Times newspaper (the source of this article) reports that Angell bragged about how he bought two kittens for £75 then sold them for £600 each the next week. The RSPCA say that the couple intended to make a gain of £278,870. Byrne was sacked in January after a misconduct investigation. She shared another property containing cannabis plants and a half-smoked joint and a pack of cannabis seeds.

21 points about the alleged scam to get people to donate to treat a sick rescue cat

This is a compressed summary in bullet fashion of an alleged scam concerning a community cat who needed expensive med treatment to be paid for via online donations. Scroll down for the bones of the story.

Gogi - alleged but not true. Pic: FB

Alleged fake vet bill. Pic: FB.

1. This is a story about an alleged scam by a 20-year-old woman who gave the impression she lived in Singapore;
2. She called herself Nora Nur;
3. She said that she had rescued a community cat from Punggol, Singapore. She claimed the cat had been abandoned;
4. She had called the cat Gogi;
5. On the Facebook group Sayang Our Singapore's Community Cats she asked for donations, small amounts like $5.10 dollars;
6. She uploaded pictures of the cat and a veterinarian's bill from a real veterinary surgery: Frankel Veterinary Centre;
7. She said the cat needed expensive treatment: 6,000 Singapore dollars for feline infectious peritonitis treatment and 800 Singapore dollars for a hysterectomy;
8. It is quite common for cat rescuers to seek donations on Facebook for veterinary treatment;
9. Allegedly, she was using this fact to get donations from people who are sympathetic towards rescue cat;
10. A member of the above Facebook group, Lee Siew Yian, did some research and decided that her appeal for donations was a scam;
11. They decided that the vet bill was a fake and the photographs of the cat were also faked. The pictures of the cat were taken from other pages on social media and there was no such cat called Gogi in need of expensive veterinary surgery and treatment;
12. The veterinary clinic concerned confirmed that they did not issued the aforesaid bill and neither had they treated a cat with that name;
13. This got back to the police and they investigated;
14. Police officers from Bedok Police Division establish the identity of the 20-year-old woman and arrested her;
15. 60 people had donated to her alleged fake cause;
16. A 25 year-old man is assisting police investigations;
17. Nora Nur changed her story said that the cat and her diseases were real but that the cat lived in Vietnam and not Singapore. She had tried to raise money in Vietnam without success. She therefore had sought funding through the Internet on a Singapore community cat Facebook webpage instead of in Vietnam;
18. Nur has been criticised by people for using animals as part of a scam to get money off people;
19. Nur apologised for what she's done and said that she will give the money back to the people who donated. She insisted that the fundraising operation had indeed occurred in Vietnam and that she had never tried to scam money. She sincerely apologised.
20. Nur and her mother decided to sponsor all of Gogi's medical bills. I take this to mean that between them they will pay the bills;
21. Can anybody trust her bearing in mind what she has done? Is she now telling the truth?

Hi everyone, after talking & talking, I have made a decision. All donors that transferred money to Davis Account...

Posted by Nora Nur on Tuesday, November 16, 2021

Amazon fake verified review scam

I guess people realise that you can't rely on Amazon reviews. You just can't be sure that they are genuine. A recent development confirms this assessment.

The people who sell on Amazon through associate agreements want to improve the ratings of their items by Amazon. The ratings are based upon reviews i.e. how many five star reviews the item receives. The fact that the reviewer is verified is important. Verified reviewers are those that have actually bought the product.

In order to achieve five-star reviews from verified reviewers, these businesses are setting up fake purchases using stolen data. They steal the data of American citizens and on their behalf they purchase the items that they are manufacturing and selling.

In doing this, they set up an account on behalf of that person i.e. the recipient. The recipient is completely unaware of what is going on and they receive unwanted goods like seeds, whistles, sunglasses and socks. A five star review is written on behalf of the unwitting recipient.

It is reported in The Times newspaper that businesses are advertising on Facebook for people to write fake reviews at a price. It is the trade in fake Amazon reviews which Facebook promised a crackdown on but apparently are not. The magazine/online website Which? found that Facebook are failing to stop it. It's called a "fake review factory". Facebook told the Competition and Markets Authority in January that it would install systems to detect and remove this sort of content.

Apparently you can find this trade on Facebook by searching for "Amazon review". There are several Facebook groups dealing in these reviews and across them there are at least 82,000 posts a month. Often these posts are from agents offering refunds and commission free products in exchange for the reviews. It is not only on Amazon that these fake reviews are written. Fake and misleading reviews are illegal under UK consumer protection law.

Which? said that over the preceding year there had been no change in the amount of trading on Facebook with respect to fake reviews. The average number of posts in individual groups are up to 5600 over a 30 day period.

The worrying aspect of this is, of course, it is a scam and online scams of varying types are a rapidly developing phenomenon on in the West and probably elsewhere. The other worrying aspect is that the scammers have acquired the personal data of Americans. We know that there have been many computer hacks leading to the acquisition of personal contact details and it is quite likely that these details are being used in this way in this instance.

The receipt of seeds by unwitting recipients in America has baffled them. People all over the US started to receive small parcels of seeds from China. At one time people thought that this was part of a Cold War. Perhaps they were sending invasive species into America to destroy America's nature; to propagate plant diseases but no, it appears that it is simply an Amazon scam.

FYI - another Amazon scam is to inadvertently get people to pay an Amazon prime subscription at an inflated price. These people receive scammy phone calls often generated by computer systems to trick them into paying an Amazon prime subscription but not at the usual rate but one which is a hundred times larger (799 rather than 7.99). Be aware of telephone scams by people referring to Amazon prime subscriptions. Never get involved with those. Put the phone down immediately. You might like to contact Amazon if you can to report it. I am sure that they are aware of it but the more reports they get the better.