Police alerted to Internet scams
By JUSTIN MASON
Reformer Staff

BRATTLEBORO -- Police are warning residents to be on guard for several scams that are sweeping Internet chat rooms and e-mail accounts.

Last week, Detective Robert Perkins said he was contacted by a local woman who had fallen prey to a scam that started in an Internet chat room nearly two months ago. The woman had maintained regular contact with a user from Nigeria, who recently asked her for help with a money transfer, Perkins said.

The user convinced the woman to accept a check to be deposited in her account. She was directed to wire a certain amount of cash to an overseas account, via Western Union, in return for a portion of the money.

She considered him a good enough friend to perform this favor for this scam, Perkins said.

But several days after sending the money, she was contacted by her bank and informed that the check she deposited was fraudulent.

Now the bank wants $6,500 that she doesn't have, Perkins said.

Although banks generally take more than 10 days to verify a check's authenticity, customers are often permitted to draw from a deposited check much earlier, he said.

Usually the people that are depositing (these checks) are established customers with the bank, Perkins said. They let them draw off it almost immediately and before the bank has even found that (the check) is counterfeit.

During his investigation, Perkins contacted the woman's bank, the Manufacturers and Traders Bank in Buffalo, N.Y., and was directed to investigator Robert Franz, who had worked similar on similar cases.

The bottom line is you're responsible for the money that goes into your account, Franz said.

The only way for banks to combat these scams is to keep people informed and let customers know that they are accountable for the money deposited in their accounts via fraudulent checks, Franz said.

The unfortunate part of it is that the relatively innocent party is being victimized, he said.

Perkins has since forwarded the case to the U.S. Secret Service for investigation, but he isn't optimistic that anyone will be caught. Because the perpetrators are overseas and the amount of money is relatively small, all traces of the crime will likely vanish before law enforcement agents investigate them, he said.

The best defense for this type of scam is for users to scrutinize unusual requests online, Franz said. If a check is coming from a questionable source, people should consult their local bank security personnel to verify its authenticity before depositing it, he said.

You can blame the Internet but it has happened elsewhere, too. The bottom line is, buyer beware, Franz said.

Another scam that is gaining momentum involves the victim being contacted through a chat room or e-mail and asked to receive merchandise from an undisclosed location, Perkins said. The victim is then asked to ship the item to an overseas address in exchange for money to be transferred after the item is received.

In instances like this, stolen credit cards or checking account numbers are used to purchase the items, which are laundered by sending them to the victim's address. When investigators attempt to track the stolen merchandise, they are led to the victim's front door.

These victims are acting on what they believe is good faith, Perkins said.

Once the merchandise is sent overseas, there is little way of ever recovering it, he said. Victims of this type of scam would only be held liable for the cost of shipping the item, provided they had no prior knowledge of the crime

Judy Eshelman, a customer service representative with SoVerNet, said these types of scams predate the Internet and have merely found a new conduit to operate through.

If the scam can come by U.S. mail or by telephone, it can come over the Internet, she said. We take every opportunity to notify to our customers about common-sense activity on the Internet.

Although SoVerNet has little control over what transpires in Internet chat rooms, the Internet service provider tries to keep users up to speed on popular scams.

We try to help people with the benefit of our experience, she said. The best way to identify and combat Internet scams is to use common sense, Eshelman said.

If an e-mail or instant message was unsolicited by the user, then there is a good chance that it is of dubious nature, she said.

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