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Cramming (fraud)
Cramming is a form of fraud in which small charges are added to a bill by a third party without the subscriber's consent, approval, authorization or disclosure. These may be disguised as a tax, some other common fee or a bogus service, and may be several dollars or even just a few cents. The crammer's intent is that the subscriber will overlook and ultimately pay these small charges without them knowing what it's all about. According to the U.S. National Association of Attorneys General, cramming was the 4th most common consumer complaint of 2007 in the United States. Types There are various forms of cramming. Phone cramming Phone cramming is the practice of placing unauthorized charges on a telecommunication subscriber's home or mobile telephone bill. Cramming is most common in the US, where the breakup of the Bell System left subscribers with different vendors for local and long-distance service. LEC billing consolidated charges from multiple vendors on one bill, but opened ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Fraud
In law, fraud is intentional deception to secure unfair or unlawful gain, or to deprive a victim of a legal right. Fraud can violate civil law (e.g., a fraud victim may sue the fraud perpetrator to avoid the fraud or recover monetary compensation) or criminal law (e.g., a fraud perpetrator may be prosecuted and imprisoned by governmental authorities), or it may cause no loss of money, property, or legal right but still be an element of another civil or criminal wrong. The purpose of fraud may be monetary gain or other benefits, for example by obtaining a passport, travel document, or driver's license, or mortgage fraud, where the perpetrator may attempt to qualify for a mortgage by way of false statements. Internal fraud, also known as "insider fraud", is fraud committed or attempted by someone within an organisation such as an employee. A hoax is a distinct concept that involves deliberate deception without the intention of gain or of materially damaging or depriving a v ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Verizon
Verizon Communications Inc., commonly known as Verizon, is an American multinational telecommunications conglomerate and a corporate component of the Dow Jones Industrial Average. The company is headquartered at 1095 Avenue of the Americas in Midtown Manhattan, New York City, but is incorporated in Delaware. The company was formed in 1984 as Bell Atlantic as part of the break up of the Bell System into seven companies, each a Regional Bell Operating Company (RBOC), commonly referred to as "Baby Bells". Headquartered in Philadelphia, it originally had an operating area from New Jersey to Virginia. In 1997, Bell Atlantic expanded into New York and the New England states by merging with fellow Baby Bell NYNEX. While Bell Atlantic was the surviving company, the merged company moved its headquarters from Philadelphia to NYNEX's old headquarters in New York City. In 2000, Bell Atlantic acquired GTE, which operated telecommunications companies across most of the rest of the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Internet Fraud
Internet fraud is a type of cybercrime fraud or deception which makes use of the Internet and could involve hiding of information or providing incorrect information for the purpose of tricking victims out of money, property, and inheritance. Internet fraud is not considered a single, distinctive crime but covers a range of illegal and illicit actions that are committed in cyberspace. It is, however, differentiated from theft since, in this case, the victim voluntarily and knowingly provides the information, money or property to the perpetrator. It is also distinguished by the way it involves temporally and spatially separated offenders. According to the FBI's 2017 Internet Crime Report, the Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3) received about 300,000 complaints. Victims lost over $1.4 billion in online fraud in 2017. According to a study conducted by the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) and McAfee, cybercrime costs the global economy as much as $600 billion ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Consumer Fraud
In law, fraud is intentional deception to secure unfair or unlawful gain, or to deprive a victim of a legal right. Fraud can violate civil law (e.g., a fraud victim may sue the fraud perpetrator to avoid the fraud or recover monetary compensation) or criminal law (e.g., a fraud perpetrator may be prosecuted and imprisoned by governmental authorities), or it may cause no loss of money, property, or legal right but still be an element of another civil or criminal wrong. The purpose of fraud may be monetary gain or other benefits, for example by obtaining a passport, travel document, or driver's license, or mortgage fraud, where the perpetrator may attempt to qualify for a mortgage by way of false statements. Internal fraud, also known as "insider fraud", is fraud committed or attempted by someone within an organisation such as an employee. A hoax is a distinct concept that involves deliberate deception without the intention of gain or of materially damaging or depriving a vi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mail And Wire Fraud
Mail fraud and wire fraud are terms used in the United States to describe the use of a physical or electronic mail system to defraud another, and are federal crimes there. Jurisdiction is claimed by the federal government if the illegal activity crosses interstate or international borders. Mail fraud Mail fraud was first defined in the United States in 1872. provides: Whoever, having devised or intending to devise any scheme or artifice to defraud, or for obtaining money or property by means of false or fraudulent pretenses, representations, or promises, or to sell, dispose of, loan, exchange, alter, give away, distribute, supply, or furnish or procure for unlawful use any counterfeit or spurious coin, obligation, security, or other article, or anything represented to be or intimated or held out to be such counterfeit or spurious article, for the purpose of executing such scheme or artifice or attempting so to do, places in any post office or authorized depository for mail ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Short Message Service
Short Message/Messaging Service, commonly abbreviated as SMS, is a text messaging service component of most telephone, Internet and mobile device systems. It uses standardized communication protocols that let mobile devices exchange short text messages. An intermediary service can facilitate a text-to-voice conversion to be sent to landlines. SMS technology originated from radio telegraphy in radio memo pagers that used standardized phone protocols. These were defined in 1986 as part of the Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM) series of standards.GSM Doc 28/85 "Services and Facilities to be provided in the GSM System" rev2, June 1985 The first SMS message was sent on 3 December 1992, when Neil Papworth, a test engineer for Sema Group, sent "Merry Christmas" to the Orbitel 901 phone of colleague Richard Jarvis. SMS rolled out commercially on many cellular networks that decade and became hugely popular worldwide as a method of text communication. By the end of 2010, SMS w ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
AT&T Mobility
AT&T Mobility LLC, also known as AT&T Wireless and Trade name, marketed as simply AT&T, is an American telecommunications company. It is a wholly owned subsidiary of AT&T, AT&T Inc. and provides wireless services in the United States. AT&T Mobility is the List of United States wireless communications service providers, third-largest wireless carrier in the United States, with 101.6 million subscribers as of the end of Q1 2022. The company is headquartered in Brookhaven, Georgia. Originally known as Cingular Wireless (a joint venture between SBC Communications and BellSouth) from 2000 to 2007, the company acquired the old AT&T Wireless Services, AT&T Wireless in 2004; SBC later acquired AT&T Corporation, the original AT&T and adopted its name. Cingular became wholly owned by AT&T in December 2006 as a result of AT&T's Mergers and acquisitions, acquisition of BellSouth. In January 2007, Cingular confirmed it would rebrand itself under the AT&T name. Although the legal corporate n ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid digital subscribers. It also is a producer of popular podcasts such as '' The Daily''. Founded in 1851 by Henry Jarvis Raymond and George Jones, it was initially published by Raymond, Jones & Company. The ''Times'' has won 132 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any newspaper, and has long been regarded as a national "newspaper of record". For print it is ranked 18th in the world by circulation and 3rd in the U.S. The paper is owned by the New York Times Company, which is publicly traded. It has been governed by the Sulzberger family since 1896, through a dual-class share structure after its shares became publicly traded. A. G. Sulzberger, the paper's publisher and the company's chairman, is the fifth generation of the family to head the p ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Salvatore LoCascio
Salvatore LoCascio (born July 21, 1958) is a reputed former caporegime in the New York Gambino crime family. His father, Frank LoCascio, was the acting underboss (1988-1990), and acting consigliere (1990-1992) for John Gotti. Early life LoCascio grew up in Eastchester, New York. In 1985, with $115,000 that he received from wedding gifts he started his own business, Creative Program Communications, Incorporated with a few friends. The Scores case In 1998, LoCascio and Michael "Mikey Scars" DiLeonardo were arrested for attempting to extort money from Scores, a famous upscale strip club in Manhattan. However, the case against LoCascio was weak, so prosecutors offered to drop the charges. In return, LoCascio pleaded guilty to tax evasion for deriving income from illegal gambling. He was sentenced to ten months, part of which was home arrest, and a $1.5 million fine. At the time of his plea, Locascio ran numerous 900 number phone services, from psychic hot lines to sports scores ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Caporegime
A caporegime or capodecina, usually shortened to capo or informally referred to as "captain" or "skipper", is a rank used in the Mafia (both the Sicilian Mafia and Italian-American Mafia) for a '' made member'' of an Italian crime family who heads a "crew" of soldiers and has major social status and influence in the organization. ''Caporegime'' is an Italian word, which is used to signify the head of a family in Sicily, but has now come to mean a ranking member, similar to captain or senior sergeant in a military unit. In general, the term indicates the head of a branch of an organized crime syndicate who commands a crew of soldiers and reports directly to the don (boss) or an underboss or street boss. The shortened version "capo" has been used to refer to certain high-ranking members of Latin American drug cartels as well. Background The Mafia, particularly the American Mafia, is typically divided into distinct and partially independent "crews" headed by a "capo" or lead ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Richard Martino
Richard Martino (born 1961) is a member of the New York Gambino crime family who was involved in Internet and phone scams that cost consumers $750 million. Martino introduced the Cosa Nostra into this area of crime. Biography A major earner for the Gambino family, Martino owned expensive homes in Harrison, New York and Southampton, New York, wore Prada shoes, and drove a Mercedes-Benz car. Martino and Gambino capo Salvatore LoCascio created what appeared to be a pornography website. Like many such sites, visitors could tour it for free by providing credit card numbers to confirm they were adults. This concept originated from a cousin of Martino's who had created a course for men, instructing them "how to pick up girls." However, Martino and LoCascio then charged the visitors an unauthorized monthly website subscription. This scam cost consumers approximately $230 million. In a different scam, Martino and Locascio created a " cramming" scheme that sent bills to customer phone compan ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Soldato
A soldato or soldier is the first official level of both the American Mafia and the Sicilian Mafia in the formal Mafia hierarchy or cadre. It is also commonly used as a rank in other Italian criminal organizations, such as the 'Ndrangheta and Camorra. The promotion to the rank of soldier is an elevation in the chain of command from the associate level. The associate, who is not an initiated member of the Mafia, must prove himself to the family and take the oath of Omertà in order to become an initiated made man and therefore rise to the rank of soldato. Picciotto (plural: ''picciotti'') is often used to refer to a lower-level mafioso or soldato, but it usually indicates a younger, inexperienced soldato and may even be used loosely to refer to a closely connected, up-and-coming associate who is not necessarily a made man yet (and therefore not yet officially a "soldato"). "Picciotti" usually perform simple tasks such as beatings, money collection, and robbery. Duties and ad ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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