Phone Scam Offers Loan but Will Rip You Blind

opinion

The Girl Next Door

By Christina Georgiou

As a professional reporter, normally I don't post things in the first person, but in this case, I'm making an exception. I'm hoping it will help someone out there avoid what is almost certainly an attempt at fraud.

Yesterday, just before 6:30 p.m., I received a phone call from the number 646-658-3157*, one that is not familiar to me. No name or company name attached.

I get a reasonable number of legitimate calls from people I don't know, or don't know well, so if it's convenient, I usually answer the phone in these cases. Hey, you never know when that hot news tip is going to happen.

And, weirdly enough, though I'm more than a little certain this caller had more the intention of ripping me off rather than tipping me off, in a sense, this call and the one after it ended up being a news tip.

So, I answer the phone, and this guy with a thick (possibly Spanish) accent asks for me by first name, greets me with his first name too quickly to catch and a company name, also too garbled to make out, but possibly "GE Banking Company," and says something (I think) about owing money on a loan. (I have not taken out a loan on anything.)

I've been getting a lot of (illegal) telemarketing calls lately (42 45 in less than a week and counting) from some company that ostensibly wants to hook me up with a higher-learning institution that offers education in a field of my choosing. Other than the fact that they are exceptionally persistent and annoying, I have no reason to believe they're not legit, though I don't know how they got my name and number either.

But, 42 45 phone calls later, I'm now at the point where anyone I don't know that doesn't start the conversation with "I've got news for you" is immediately subject to my asking who they are, what company they represent, and how they got my cell phone number.

Which is exactly what I immediately ask this guy last night, without confirming my identity. He hangs up.

While thinking the situation odd and pondering whether there is a problem or not, exactly three minutes later, the phone rings again, this time with the incoming number being listed as local and with the same last four digits as the last incoming call. (One in 9,999 odds of that happening.) Curiously, the prefix is the same as mine and is designated for Easton by my cell phone carrier.

I answer the phone. Same guy, same scenario. I can't catch his name or company, but I manage to keep him on the phone long enough to determine that this time, he's telling me I've been pre-qualified for a $10,000 loan from his company.

I ask his name and company name again. He ignores me, and tells me this is the loan I applied for.

I tell him I most certainly have NOT applied for any loan and demand to know his name, the company he's ostensibly calling from, and where he got my number from.

He hangs up.

I ponder the situation some  more. I've given this guy no additional information, other than that I'm the sort of person who's going to ask a lot of very stern questions. That's definitely not a bad thing, but still, the calls have me a bit worried, especially since I've experienced at least three identity theft attempts, with the last one I know about less than three years ago.

So, I hit the web with the little info I've got, starting with the phone number.

Turns out, not only does it look like this is definitely a scam attempt, but the number appears to be associated with some very bad things, including extortion attempts.

Web user reports suggest that the same person that called me called others late last spring and summer, telling them that they'd defaulted on loans they say they never took out. In some cases, this person not only demanded payment, but impersonated police or other authorities.

Reportedly too, people received calls from this number and after hanging up, they'd receive others that appeared to originate from "911"--which means whoever this is is also capable of phone number spoofing.

A search of "GE Bank Company" turned up nothing that seemed related, though there are a huge number of complaints that sound legitimate regarding General Electric's banking and lending firm, as well as others that refer to the mortgage fraud scandal from a few years ago.

However, my searching also turned up a company called "GE Money Bank", not related to General Electric. While GE Money Bank does seem to be a licensed firm that handles credit and loan transactions for a number of large firms, including Walmart, their ethics sound dubious.

It's unclear whether they actually do payday loans, or if these apparent attempts at phone scamming are in any way related to the actual company, but what is clear is that the name is being used all over the place as part of the fraud attempts.

The phone number from which the call to me originated is only one of dozens being used this way, according to my searches.

Had I not bitten this guy's head off, the scenario probably would have gone something like this:

Guy says I'm preapproved for a loan of "x" amount (most of the reports I found were much lower than the $10,000 sum I was "offered"--from a few hundred to about $3,000 seems more common). But, there's an "application fee" and/or "processing fees" that need to be paid before the loan can go through. The "agent" of "GE Money BanK" then tells the victim to go buy some pre-paid card, like a Green Dot or pre-paid Visa check card for somewhere between $50 and a couple of hundred dollars, and to call back with the card number to transfer the cash.

After that happens to those unsavvy enough not to realize this is a complete scam, these scammers promise the money will be in the victim's account on "X" date, usually in about 48 hours. But the money doesn't arrive, and when the victim calls back to find out where their "loan" is, they're told that because of their credit rating, even more cash is needed to secure the loan.

Again, they're instructed to buy some pre-paid check card and fork over the cash, usually in an amount larger than the first.

Needless to say, the money never arrives.

And, worse, now the scammers have the poor person's bank account info, along with other bits of info like their address, phone number and likely even their social security number--which is often enough to steal their identity to open other accounts in their name.

This particular scam, using the name "GE Money Bank", is not an isolated thing--there are hundreds of reports of this on the web. Since it's reasonable to assume the majority of people don't take the time to write a report on scam awareness sites, and there are numerous such sites anyway, this means that a whole lot of people have been targeted by these parasites, and many more than are reporting it are ripped off this way.

The scam is particularly pernicious when you realize they are attempting to steal money from those that can afford it the least.

Not only that, the people this scam targets are the least likely to have the resources to fight back and hire a lawyer, if in fact they can actually be located to be sued.

I've already notified the police of the calls I received. They recommend filing a formal report at the station, and also notifying all three credit reporting agencies of the attempt, along with placing a "fraud alert" on my accounts.

Sadly, they say there is little they will be able to do, since many of these criminals operate internationally.

But making the formal report will get it on the record, in case my identity actually has been stolen, and perhaps it will mean the report gets passed along to the state authorities in New York, where the first call ostensibly originated, and to federal authorities, who I am sure have a very, very large stack of similar reports.

Will these people get caught? It seems unlikely that will happen any time soon. If they were easy to catch, they wouldn't have been getting away with it for what is now years.

But, there are still ways to help protect yourself.

First, NEVER give out any personal information about yourself over the phone! If an unknown caller from some company is actually legitimate, they should be willing to answer all of your questions before they ask any information from you. They won't hang up when you ask reasonable questions, such as their name, the company they represent, the exact reason they're calling, where they got your number what number they can be reached at, what their company website is, etc.

A call back number isn't always enough, but you should get one if possible. If you're suspicious of a call too, you can always get the company name, look up their customer service number on the web, and call that number to verify that whoever called you is legit. Be exceptionally wary of any financial services company that doesn't seem to have a website--they pretty much universally all do--after all, it's a great way to take payments and a legitimate company won't be worried about being tracked or contacted that way.

If you're taking out a loan, know that it's unheard of for a financial institution to demand application or processing fees up front. In fact, it may even be illegal.

As for the terms and interest rates of any loan, you should have them in writing. Still, since there are also reports of scammers using the "GE Money Bank" name and sending both solicited and unsolicited mail for the same type of fraud I've described, be leery of paperwork that comes in the mail promising a pre-approved or payday loan.

Payday loans, while never a good idea, are still legal in Pennsylvania, so if you decide you absolutely must take one out, do it with a company physically doing business here, not online or over the phone. That way, if something illegal occurs with the deal, you'll have a reasonable shot at recourse, like reporting them to the state attorney general's office. With those out of state or in some unknown location, or ones that operate from overseas, there really is just about nothing you can do if they illegally take your money or ruin your credit rating.

Besides that I've gotten an education into how this particular scam works, and that the call I thought might be a news tip actually was a news tip, even if the caller didn't intend it, it's also gotten my blood pressure up a bit.

Forget flight, I'm up for a fight.

There have been numerous reports locally, the last just a couple of days ago in Wilson Borough, of scammers knocking on doors pretending to be various utility company workers.

I also heard from a neighbor that scammers purporting from UGI passed through my block one Saturday a couple of weeks ago.

Now, I'm almost hoping they come back, and I dare them to knock on my door, 'cause I've got a camera waiting for them, and I'm chomping at the bit to get a picture of these creeps.

If there isn't a special place in hell for parasites like this, well, we can always try to make one here on Earth for them.

*Note: Normally The Easton Eccentric does not publish phone numbers, but due to the large number of fraud attempts associated with this number and the fact that no ones personal information is apparently attached to it, we are making an exception in this case.

If anything like this has happened to you, please report it to the authorities, even if it seems like they won't get caught (this time). Eventually, they will, and the more people that complain, the more likely it is something will eventually be done about it. And, tell everyone in the comments section below too...The more people that know about this scam and others, the less likely it is that scamming scum will get away with stealing people's hard-earned cash in the mean time!

9 Lives and the Kindness of Strangers

opinion

The Girl Next Door

By Christina Georgiou

It's long been a part of folk wisdom that cats seem to have nine lives. And certainly, in all the years I've had cats, I've seen them pull through some amazing things, but this one may take the prize.

At the end of July, one of my cats, Bella, managed to fall out a second story window of my apartment onto Northampton Street. If that isn't bad enough, he managed to do it when I was either out or in the middle of the night when I was sleeping.

I normally cover open windows with a screen to keep the bugs out, but this one was only open a few inches, and I had real no reason to believe it was a cat hazard either.

But Bella managed to find the opening and since the window overhangs a roof ledge, he apparently thought he'd get himself some clandestine roof time—something he enjoyed occasionally at my last apartment, but that isn't really feasible here.

Bella is 17, and I've had him since the day he was born—in my bedroom closet—to a cat I rescued when I still lived in Bucks County. He was a beautiful kitten, and his Siamese coloration and markings were a complete surprise based on mom's looks and those of his littermates. I realize now his name should have been “Bela” but my Italian is pretty awful, and it ended up being “Bella” instead.

This was well before the “Twilight”series got popular, so the name sort of mystified people, but it stuck and when asked, I just said he was named for Bela Lugosi. As he got a little bigger, the fact that he's got a mischievous streak became apparent, too. Though he's generally a very nice cat, it seemed to fit him.

When Bella fell out the window, I had no idea what had happened. At first, when he didn't appear for breakfast, I thought he'd holed up somewhere and was taking a long nap—being an old guy now, it's something he does now and again. But when I didn't see him for a whole day, I started to worry he'd fallen ill and was hiding somewhere.

I tore my apartment apart looking for him, but no Bella. It took almost two days for me to realize he wasn't in my apartment at all and to piece together how he had gotten out.

Realizing he was lost out on the streets of Easton, I was frantic. Other than a short time when he was a young kitten and I still lived out in the country, he's never really been outdoors—he's strictly been a house cat.

Like any long-lived cat, he's had the occasional bad scrape over the years, but he's made it through. Bella survived the house fire I suffered in 2008—he was literally rescued from the flames by the Easton Fire Department and given oxygen by Easton EMTs, and we both owe his life to them.

A year or two later, at my former residence, he climbed down a tree that overhung the roof, couldn't figure out how to get back up, and spent a few hours alternating between hiding terrified under parked cars and taunting a couple members of the EPD K9 unit in their kennels housed in the city parking deck. But that unintentional adventure lasted only one evening and once rescued, he never tried to climb down a tree off the roof again. (He also had severely limited roof access after that.)

But when he went missing this time, I realized he had practically no chance of even knowing how to get back home, and the traffic on Northampton Street meant he'd be to scared to hang around long, if at all, not to mention, precious time had already passed.

I was more than a little upset. I immediately made up a stack of posters and hung them on nearly every light pole for a 1 to 2 block radius around my apartment and got them posted in several shop windows too. Given his distinctive looks, I thought there was a reasonable chance he'd be found, or at least be seen and recognized by the neighbors.

I also put cat food out in logical (from a cat's standpoint) places nearby, along with spending hours late at night looking for him, when it was most quiet and he was most likely to come out of hiding.

Neighbors saw him on numerous occasions, about every two or three days, but he'd run off every time anyone got close. Despite the hours of hunting and also of sitting quietly near the food I put out twice a day, I didn't have any luck running into him.

This went on for over a month, and then suddenly, there were no more sightings.

At his age, Bella, my “senior dude”, is a very old man, the equivalent of an 80- or 90-year-old person. He's spry for his age, but he's also nearly toothless and a lot slower than he was in his youth. I'm pretty sure his eyesight isn't what is was when he was younger either, which also explains how he slipped and missed the roof ledge when climbing out that window.

I was truly heartbroken and feared the worst. I didn't stop putting out food but I stopped going out every night calling his name for hours. I suspected by then the neighbors were beginning to think I was a little nuts, too. I kind of wondered it myself, but the thought that he might be nearby, sick or injured, was horrible.

Still, given the amount of time since he'd last been spotted, I had to admit, the chances of him coming home were dwindling

But even when things look most grim, fortune sometimes smiles.

This past Monday, my landlord mentioned in passing that a woman told him over the weekend she'd seen Bella hanging out at night by the dumpsters behind the CVS at 15^th Street where she worked, prompted by the poster with Bella's picture still up in his shop window. He'd told her to call me, but she never did.

Still, it was a better lead than I'd had in a long while. I had no idea how he might have gotten a mile down the road. But perhaps someone had managed to catch him and tried to take him home only to have him escape. It was in the realm of possibility, however slim.

So late Monday night, I went to CVS.

The woman that stopped in the shop hadn't left her name, and the only description I had from my landlord was that she was African-American and works at the pharmacy.

The clerk that night, Denice, hadn't seen Bella, and unsurprisingly, more than one African-American woman works there. But Denice patiently listened to the story and agreed to put a copy of the poster in the employee breakroom, just in case. I left with my fingers crossed, though the chance of finding Bella still seemed unlikely.

Wednesday around noon, I got a phone call from a man named Tom, who also works at CVS.

He was working one night a couple of weeks ago at the pharmacy, he said. It was raining hard that night, and at some point, Bella just literally walked in through the automated front door, starving and dehydrated, soaked to the skin and covered in burrs.

Tom said he'd seen Bella out back by the dumpsters a couple of times previously, looking like he was looking for something to eat, but up until the cat walked into the store, he hadn't gotten close.

Instead of shooing him out of the store like a lot of people might, Tom, who happens to be a cat lover, took him home that night to nurse him back to health.

Bella was not in good shape, he said. He'd picked up fleas and a case of worms, in addition to having lost a lot of weight. It took days to get the mats and burrs out of his fur.

Tom patiently cleaned him up, fed him and housed him separately from his own cats. He had no idea how to find me or even that Bella actually had a home and hadn't been dumped, as so many cats are. But he did it anyway.

And Wednesday afternoon, Tom delivered Bella to my front door, along with the food, vitamins and naturopathic supplements he'd purchased to aid in his recovery. He refused to accept any reimbursement for his trouble.

Sometimes I think there are people out there that are really angels in disguise. I don't think there are words to describe how grateful I am.

I'm still in amazed at how things turned out, and I think Bella is too. He's been walking around the apartment, looking at everything again and again, alternately purring and “talking” nearly incessantly. The other cats reaccepted him immediately, although they keep insisting on trying to sniff him as though they're trying to determine where he's been.

Bella is still understandably a little “tweaked” from what must have been a terrible experience, but he's already showing signs of being himself again. He's also been wolfing food down voraciously.

But it's an incredibly happy ending, despite the odds. Other than that the attitude of “never give up” has been proven once again to be a very worthwhile one, the other thing I've had reaffirmed from this is that, that yes, cats do have apparently nine lives.

And, that though circumstances can be seemingly cruel sometimes, there are also some very good people out there. Their actions are what make the world a better place.

My sincere thanks to the several people that collectively helped Bella get home, most especially Tom at CVS!

Lack of Civic Literacy Is a Real Issue

opinion

The Girl Next Door

By Christina Georgiou

Yesterday, David C. Gorczynski, 22, of Easton, was arrested in the city and charged with two counts apiece of attempted robbery and making terroristic threats and a summary disorderly conduct charge after he visited Wells Fargo and Bank of America with signs reading “You're being robbed” and “"Give a man a gun, he can rob a bank. Give a man a bank, and he can rob a country.”

Gorczynski, who is known locally for participating in numerous peaceful protests and is affiliated with the Occupy Easton group, apparently was attempting to inform customers of those financial institutions that he felt they were getting a bum deal.

In that regard, he was probably right. Bank of America in particular has been shown to gouge customers in a variety of ways, from high service fees, to overcharging and double charging for services, to serious problems with their home mortgages.

I think I've met him once or twice and spoke with him briefly last year, during some of the the Occupy Easton events. A very nice guy, who sincerely wants to do good. We need more people, especially of his generation, who care to take the time and actually make an effort to make the world a better place.

But bringing a sign that says, “You're being robbed” into any financial institution is an ill-considered move, even when accompanied by another that more or less clarifies that the carrier of such signs is trying to protest the practices of, not rob, the bank.

A simple change of wording would have made all the difference here, I think. “This bank steals your hard-earned money,” for instance, or “Attention customers! This bank is robbing you!” would have gotten the same message out without completely ruining Gorczynski's day.

While Gorczynski is responsible for his own actions, I don't entirely blame him for the bad choice of wording, or his likely ignorance of the consequences of walking into a bank with such a sign. At 22, he's a recent product of the education system, which hasn't taught much of anything about civics for decades now. It's not doing so much for students' writing skills either.

He likely didn't realize that ANY note, sign or language in a bank that even jokes about theft is nearly certain to result in arrest, even when one has no intention of committing a crime. If he did, I'm pretty sure that sign would have carried different wording to make it clear that he thinks banking customers are victims of theft,

I'm nearly twice his age, and civics education wasn't much better during my school days either. In fact, the only reason I really know a bit about it is because of my experience in the news world and my own community involvement prior to becoming a reporter. Most people my age don't know much about the subject either, though life experience has probably imparted a little bit more knowledge.

Civics is everything from how our government is structured and how it works, to how civil law and everyday rules operate, like what the fine print in a residential lease agreement means, how banks operate, etc.

It's pretty scary how much people don't know, regardless of their age. That's one of the main reasons we're being overrun by banks that get away with gouging and corporations that get away with all sorts of shenanigans, including political influence, I think. People just don't understand exactly what's happening, and when they do, they don't really know what to effectively do about it.

That Gorczynski's friends protested his arrest, calling it unfair and saying that since people know him locally he shouldn't be held or charged with any offense, proves he's not alone in lack of civics education.

It's not the police's job to decide if someone is innocent or guilty. That's the job of the judiciary, not law enforcement, to make that call.

Sure, police decide if the situation warrants charges. But when the law essentially says to detain anyone that says something like, “You're being robbed” in a bank and they witness a person with a sign that says exactly that after being called by bank employees and others, they are duty-bound to arrest that person, regardless if they know them or not. They took an oath to do so.

The protesters yesterday evening are of varying ages, so not all of them have the excuse of age, but since civics hasn't been taught properly in at least 60 years in most places in this country, that they don't seem to realize this is not terribly surprising.

However, continued ignorance of civics won't serve their cause. One can scream all one wants that something isn't fair, but if one doesn't know how a system works, it's nearly impossible to effect a change in that system. “Know your enemy” is always sound advice.

And, it doesn't look good, to the few that know how the system does work. It only serves to empower those that game the status quo for its own gain at the expense, literally, of others.

I personally think Gorczynski is right—Bank of America and Wells Fargo do rip off their customers, many of whom bank with those institutions out of ignorance of the alternatives, like a smaller bank that actually invests in the community, or a credit union.

I also think the Occupy groups are right—that this country is being overrun by the special interests of large corporations and financial institutions, to the great detriment of “We the People” and directly contrary to the reason this country was founded.

I also very much hope the charges against Gorczynski are dropped in court, or at least lessened to something much lower than felony charges. While I may agree with the arrest, simply because the police were doing the job we pay them to do and because I don't want actual bank robbers to think that carrying a second sign or note that makes it look like they might be protesting something will get them off, I don't agree with the charges that Gorczynski was intending to rob the bank or that he made terroristic threats.

I'm glad he's been bailed out too.

We need more people like Gorczynski and the protesters that support him out there. But to win, they need to get savvy quickly, and educate themselves about how that system actually works so they can fix the things that need fixing.