Saturday, May 14, 2016

Scam Spotting: too-good job offer, fake website, and Bitcoins

A redditor recently posted on /r/scams about a too-good-to-be-true job offer:
Hi all, I was hoping you could help me figure if this job offer is a scam. So I received an email saying that I had applied for customer service representative at another company, that was an agency they work with (note I did apply to this), and that they believe me to be better suited for a better job. The HR rep who contacted me said she's confident I stand a chance, and so she wants to forward my application to the hiring manager. The company is currently based on switzerland, and they are opening an office in my area (Toronto Canada) on May 30th. All she requested was that I fill out the employment application. There was nothing weird about the application, it asked for my usual contact info and two work references. No sin number or anything private, or that they couldn't get off my resume. The reason I'm weirded out is because the pay is substantial (for reference it's +20/hr and i'm still in school) and they mentioned the company works with bitcoin. The company name is Trimension Capital Holding. Does anybody have any experience that they'd be willing to share on if this is a scam or not?
This already has a couple red flags

  • Based in Switzerland, but opening an office in Toronto
  • Over $20 per hour for someone not yet out of school
  • Encouraged to apply even if not certain qualified (to do what, exactly?)
  • It involves "Bitcoins"
But let's track this down all the way. If you search for "Trimension Capital" on Google, you will get back a Trimension Capital GmbH at Baarerstrasse 135, 6301 Zug, Switzerland. So far, it matches. 

My first link took me to moneyhouse.ch profile fo the company, and we larned that company was founded in 2012 as "Pinewood Capital GmbH", changed name to "Trimension Capital GmbH" in 2013, and changed to "Trimension Capital Holding GmbH" in 2014. It's headed by Thomas Bieri. Under "contact" it shows website as trimension-capital.com

MoneyHouse.ch says the website should be trimension-capital.com

Next couple links goes to trimensioncapital.com   NO DASH!!!!!!!


Something is very fishy here. Let's check DNS at WHO.IS

Friday, May 13, 2016

Scam Tactics: False citing of legislation or certification authority

Scams, in order to claim false legitimacy, will cite laws, regulations, and licenses to sound official, when they are grossly exaggerating the truth, or are outright lying.

Below we will discuss four example of such outrageous fraudulent behavior, and how you can see through such deception with just Google and some sense of skepticism.

Gemcoin, USFIA, and AB129

USFIA was an alleged 32 million ponzi scheme shut down by SEC on September 29, 2015, having been previously chased out of China in 2014 by Chinese authorities. Two of the perps were arrested in Thailand in 2014 through China's Operation Foxhunt extradition program and extradited with other perps back to China, only to see the scheme restart in the US under the same US leader Steve Chen.

When it was running at full steam their marketing material claimed that Gemcoin, their supposed altcoin was the first cryptocurrency authorized by California bill AB129.

Gemcoin believers repeating claims that Gemcoin was first cryptocurrency authorized by
California bill AB129 (2014). It was complete bull****, of course. Every bit of Steve Chen's assets
had been counted and it came out to only 20 or so million. "50 billion"? Hilarious. 
The problem is AB129 said no such thing. The full text of AB129 is easily Google-able.It is only a single sentence.  It simply says that from here on California's restriction (that all transactions must be done with US dollars) is rescinded.  Gemcoin was not mentioned or referenced.

Yet the Gemcoin believers did not question the claim. They simply accepted the extraordinary claim as true. And they put in money for something "backed by amber".

There was no amber or amber mine. And now their money is lost or tied up in an international ponzi scheme. At least report, the receiver that took over the company can only locate about 20 million of the 32+ million believed to be involved. A big amount was sent overseas to China and Singapore.

But at least USFIA scam referenced a real law. The next scammer simply made up an agency that doesn't exist.