Like the animal, a mule is a person who transports something from one place to another. That’s why we’re talking about how you can protect yourself from becoming a money mule. Tune in to Money, I’m Home as Lynne is joined by Consumers Senior Fraud Specialist Kristy Desimone to talk about some best practices in protecting yourself and loved ones from fraudsters.

 

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0:00:06.6 Lynne Jarman-Johnson (LJJ): Money, I’m Home. Welcome in. I’m Lynne Jarman-Johnson with Consumers Credit Union. I’ll tell you what, we have so much fun, and fun is a really weird word when you’re focusing on fraud. It feels strange, not connected. But here’s why it is connected. Kristy Desimone is our wonderful fraud specialist here at Consumers Credit Union. She’s always looking for ways to make sure that we can prevent fraud from happening to you. And it truly has become such a fun topic. People are loving listening to your expertise, Kristy. Thanks for being with us today.

0:00:40.1 Kristy Desimone (KD): Of course! It’s just so relevant, and I live for helping people not fall for scams. [chuckle]

0:00:46.4 LJJ: You know, you and I were talking just recently. One of the things that you have always said is, “Lynne, look at the email, make sure that you know the person who’s sending it to you.” Well, just recently, this just happened to me. Now tell me if this has ever happened to you. I started getting these, “Oh, you have the opportunity to claim money here.” And then I went to unsubscribe, and it says, “Put your email in.” And all of a sudden, it dawned on me, you said, “Lynne, don’t forget to make sure that the email’s correct.” Well, I go back and it is the most convoluted email I’ve ever seen that they must have, what? Masked my own, and now I’m getting it, and if I would have put my email in to unsubscribe, I wouldn’t have been unsubscribed!

0:01:32.3 KD: Right, and sometimes companies like Google, and even here at Consumers, you can report them as a scam or phishing email instead of hitting unsubscribe, because you never know what is connected to that unsubscribe link. So, it could be like I’m employing some type of malware to your computer, because you’re hitting unsubscribe and you’re entering your real email address. So, if you’re using Google Mail or some other type of email provider, they, a lot of times, are able to report it as a scam or abuse instead of clicking the unsubscribe. So, that may be the better route to go.

0:02:07.3 LJJ: Oh, that is awesome, thank you so much. I will absolutely do that now. See? See what I learned just like that! [chuckle]

0:02:14.9 KD: [chuckle] Love learning.

0:02:16.6 LJJ: That’s why these podcasts are so highly listened to, because you truly do have such great content. So, tell us a little bit about what you want to talk about today. Anything happening out there?

0:02:25.2 KD: Yeah, so we’re going to talk about the concept of being a money mule. So, we have started to notice a trend with cryptocurrency and wire fraud that people are being considered a money mule. Which means that…

0:02:41.4 LJJ: And you’re talking like mule, M-U-L-E? Money mule.

0:02:44.1 KD: Yes, yes. So mules, they pull a lot of heavy things and they move things from place to place, and that equates to moving money from place to place. So, fraudsters will move money from someone else’s account into yours, and then say, “Hey, send it out via Bitcoin back to me.” So, that they can continue to make the trail harder and harder to find the funds when someone realizes that it’s fraud.

0:03:11.1 LJJ: Wow. How do you even get started in something like that?

0:03:14.9 KD: Yeah, a lot of times, it’s, “Hey, I need some help. I will help you pay your bills, so you can keep a little bit and then move a little bit for me, that’d be great.” Or it equates to, “Hey, we’re investing this money and we’re helping you out, you’re going to see so much more money in return.” Or, a lot of times, people are just like, “Isn’t this normal? It’s a friend of mine that I’ve known forever on the internet, and I just help them move money from place to place.” When in reality, it is being a money mule, which translates to a fraudulent transaction.

0:03:50.3 LJJ: So, what happens if all of a sudden, you’re suspecting this just doesn’t feel right? And right now, the economic uncertainty that’s happening to all of us, does that make this happen more frequently?

0:04:04.0 KD: I think it does, but also being a money mule has been around for a while. So, it’s an easy way to hide the trail of money if a fraudster is trying to do that. So most likely, the end of the trail, they want it all out in cash, because once it’s out in cash, it is completely untraceable. So, they do these multiple transactions with multiple different people to try to make it harder for law enforcement and agencies to find where they took the funds to and from.

0:04:35.8 LJJ: Wow. Now, because of Bitcoin, this is something that has come up so often, and you hear now about scams that are happening with Bitcoin, is that similar to the scams that happen to anyone who says, “Hey, put your money here and I’m going to guarantee you this rate of return.” It’s probably too good to be true.

0:04:55.1 KD: 100%, it’s very similar. And Bitcoin is an interesting factor because it’s something that isn’t regulated by the government. So, there’s a whole different world of what’s going on there, because we can’t guarantee like, hey, if something happens, you have this amount of money protected by the Federal Reserve. In Bitcoin, nothing is protected. So, you could put in millions of dollars and get nothing out of it, if the market crashes or things change drastically, so the uncertainty with Bitcoin is also unnerving to people who are attempting it for the first time.

0:05:32.6 LJJ: So, when someone approaches you, as you said, this has been around for a long time, this trust factor is part of it, isn’t it? You know, has this person been trying to get your trust, retain your trust?

0:05:45.9 KD: Oh, yeah. That’s the hardest part about these money mule scams, is someone says, “Well, I’ve known this person for six months to a year, online. We’ve met, they reached out, we’ve talked,” and they feel really connected to this person who’s invested a lot of time in building a relationship and building that trust only to be like, “Hey, I need you to take these funds and put them somewhere.” You’re like, “Okay, I’ll do it, we’re friends. I trust you.” And we have to come and say, “Hey, unfortunately, this person does not have your best interest at heart, and this is kind of what the scam is.” So, sometimes, it can be difficult for members to hear that because they’ve built a relationship with this person.

0:06:25.0 LJJ: This reminds me, Kristy, of the dating scams.

0:06:31.1 KD: It does. Yes, it does. And sometimes it…

0:06:34.5 LJJ: They’re not even real people.

0:06:36.1 KD: I know. It does. And those are the hardest, and for me, they’re always the most… They hit me in the feels, because you build relationships with people and that’s what we’re here for. And sometimes you have to learn that some people don’t have your best interest at heart. And that’s always tough.

0:06:53.2 LJJ: Well, I’ll tell you what, you always have our best interest at heart, Kristy. Thank you so much. And listen up, if you have a topic that you’d like to share, just send it our way. We’ve got another fraud documentation coming up next month. I’ll tell you what, these really have become so popular and we’re so excited everybody’s listening in. I’m Lynne Jarman-Johnson with Consumers Credit Union. Hey, thank you Jake Esselink for your production skills. Everybody, have a wonderful week. Thanks, Kristy.

0:07:18.4 KD: Thanks.

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