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Vox Populi: Elon Musk And His Poll On Pardoning Assange And Snowdon!
Elon Musk, the new Twitter owner and CEO, knows how to provoke. While the old Twitter management focused primarily on moderating tweets and topics, Musk continues to introduce provocative topics and put critical questions to the vote. Most recently, he asked whether Julian Assange and Edward Snowden, prosecuted by U.S. authorities, should be pardoned. Of the more than 3.3 million participants, more than 80% voted for pardon. An impressive poll, a great development.
Latest Updates
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Urgent Warning Against Bulgarian Broker Scams Royal Capitals Et Al!
The Royal Capitals broker scam is promoted via fraudulent crypto campaigns like Bit IQ and fake news articles. Anyone who registers there is automatically redirected to the scam's payment page. The operator of Royal Capitals is allegedly Shadlake Ltd, registered in Bulgaria. As facilitating payment processors, we found OpenUp, ArdelixPay, ChargeMoney, or RESET for credit card payments. They should stay far away and protect their financial health and data.
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Italian’s Giorgia Meloni And Her Plans To Decriminalize Cash Payments!
Italy's Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, who heads the far-right Brothers of Italy party, has previously criticized the pressure for card payments as an “illegitimate gift to banks” and a “hidden tax” on small businesses. In the campaigns, she vowed to push back and partly reinstate a cash society. She also plans to raise the cap on cash payments to €5,000 from the existing limit of €1,000. However, following talks with the EU Commission over the issue, she may reconsider her position.
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UK NCA Arrested Russian Oligarch On Charges Of Money Laundering! Released On Bail!
The UK National Crime Agency (NCA) arrested a rich Russian oligarch at his luxury home in London. Along with him, a 35- and 39-year-old were arrested on suspicion of money laundering, conspiracy to defraud the Home Office, and conspiracy to commit perjury. The NCA has not exposed the name of the the three individuals. They have since been released on bail. Allegedly, it was NCA's first arrest of a Russian oligarch in the UK about money laundering in 22 years.
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Italian Consob Orders Black Out Of Four Illegal Financial Websites
On 5 December 2022, Italian regulator Consob announced that it ordered the black-out of five illegally operating online trading websites related to five broker scams. The total number of black-out orders increase to 809. Consob has been authorized by the so-called “Growth Decree” to order Internet connectivity service providers to inhibit access from Italy to illegal financial websites. Below are the sites to be blacked out:
Payment Processors
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Urgent Warning Against Broker Scam CT Matador!
We have warned against the broker scam CTMatador for several months now. Trustpilot warns against fake reviews CTMatador has used to present itself as reputable. But the scam is still online and attacking consumers. As payment processors, we discovered the notorious scam facilitators Finanic, GameChangers, ChargeMoney, and Paypound. In our today's review, none of the payment options worked. Currently, the payment system is not active; it seems like the scam is about to vanish!
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Payvision: How To Make Business With Criminals!
ING's current subsidiary Payvision will close in 2023. The reason for this was the massive involvement of Payvision in cybercrime and money laundering activities under its founder and former CEO Rudolf Booker. Booker sold Payvision to ING for around €350 million in 2018. How unabashedly Booker did business with cybercrime organizations as CEO is shown files from the criminal proceedings against convicted fraudster Gal Barak. Here is a remarkable scene from the criminal file!
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Merchant Alert: New High-Risk Payment Processor BizzBusters Ante Portas!
BizzBusters Ltd was a UK-registered company founded in 2012 by Indian Anurag Pratap Singh, the husband of British-Indian high-risk payment scammer Ruchi Rathor. The company was dissolved in 2016 via a compulsory strike-off and has disappeared. According to whistleblower information, BizzBusters is now to be revived via an Indian company. The mastermind behind the BizzBusters project would be Ruchi Rathor's son-in-law, Yuvraj Singh, and his brother Swaraj Singh.
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New Allegations Against Payvision Founder Rudolf Booker, Who Sees A Witch Hunt!
Since the money-laundering prosecution of Payvision and its founders became known, the Dutch media has been intensively interested in the founder Rudolf Booker but also in the role of ING. In an interview with Financieele Dagblad, Rudolf Booker sees a witch hunt against him. The authorities are investigating whether ING paid an inflated purchase price for Payvision. Booker indignantly rejects all accusations and points to ING.
Cybercrime Court Cases
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Popcorn Days: Wirecard Trial Starts With Open Questions About Its Shadow Structure!
The Wirecard trial begins on 8 Dec 2022. The main question will be: Who is responsible for the scandal? Markus Braun, the founder and former CEO, Oliver Bellenhaus, managing director of Wirecard Dubai, and the former head of accounting, Stephan von Erffa have to answer critical questions! Braun and his accomplices are alleged to have operated Wirecard as a criminal organization, the indictment says. The court has scheduled 100 days of hearings. In an underground courtroom.
Regulatory Updates
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Updated Review For High-Risk Payment Processor PayOp!
PayOp is a high-risk payment processor operated through Transferop Payment Gateway Ltd, a money service business registered with FINTRAC Canada, and Fintech Decision Pte. Ltd, registered with MAS in Singapore. We last discovered PayOp as a payment processor in the Binarium broker scam (report here). According to the latest Similarweb statistics, PayOp receives the most traffic from websites in high-risk industries. Here is our updated review!
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FCA-Regulated High-Risk Payment Processor PayDo Finally Terminated Russian Business!
In October 2022, we published our initial review of the high-risk payment processor PayOp and revealed that it is essentially a Ukrainian scheme operated through legal entities in Canada and Singapore. The Ukrainian Sherii Zakharov is the controlling person. At the time of your initial review, PayDo was heavily engaged in Russia, which accounted for more than 30% of its website visitors. Since we published our report, PayDo terminated its Russian connections, blocked Russian visitors, and started to defame FinTelegram!
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