Research Project Money Mule Scam

Summary:
Email, supposedly from a freelance scientific researcher, offers the recipient part time work processing cheques and money orders in return for a percentage of the processed fees (Full commentary below).



Status:
False - Money Laundering Scam

Example:(Submitted, May 2008)


Commentary:
Often, from the criminal's point of view, compromising a bank account via a phishing scam, or procuring fake or stolen credit cards, cheques or money orders is only one part of the process. To gain the full benefit of their criminal activities, scammers often have to "launder" the proceeds of fraud.

©iStockphoto.com/Kativ Bogus emails ostensibly offering part time work try to fool recipients into participating in criminal money-laundering schemes

To avoid detection, they will often attempt to "convert" the stolen proceeds into untraceable cash via an intermediary who has been tricked or coerced into performing such laundering duties.

Although often guilty of nothing more than gullibility, these hapless "money mules" may ultimately find themselves in serious trouble with the law because the money trail will lead directly to their door. They may be blissfully unaware of the fact that they are participating in criminal activities and aiding and abetting fraudsters. To make matters worse, they might themselves become the victims of fraud. The criminals running such operations will often request a large amount of sensitive personal information from their mule in the form of fake "job contracts" and other supposedly legal work-related documents. Over time, the scammers may collect enough information to compromise the financial accounts of their victims directly or steal their identity.

One method that scammers use to procure workers is to spam out thousands of unsolicited "job offer" emails like the one included above. Typically, these emails will claim that the recipient can gain well-paid part time work by "processing" funds sent to them by "clients" or "customers". All the workers need do to earn their wages is to accept money sent to them via a bank account, cheques or money orders, deduct a percentage to keep for themselves, and then wire the remainder back to their "employers" via an International money transfer service. Thus, the mule performs all the risky business of processing the stolen funds. Once each of these transactions is complete, the criminal responsible ends up with the bulk of the stolen funds in the form of cash that cannot be traced to him. When the police finally catch up with the poor patsy processing the funds, the criminal can simply disappear, cash in hand.

The particular example included here deals in money orders and cheques which are almost sure to be stolen or counterfeit. However, a great many variations of the same basic "job offer" scam are continually distributed via email. I receive dozens of such messages every week along with emails from people all over the world that have been caught out by such scams. Some instruct victims to process cheques or funds transfers via their bank accounts or via online payment services such as PayPal. Others, such as the example above, ask victims to cash cheques or money orders at a bank or post office. All instruct would-be workers to deduct their remuneration directly from the funds they are processing at a specified percentage rate and wire the remainder as cash back to the "employee".

Thankfully, money mule scam messages are not at all hard to recognize:

• It is exceptionally unlikely that any legitimate company would ever attempt to employ somebody for an important and responsible job involving financial transactions via an unsolicited email. The very fact that such a position is being openly offered via email should be enough alone to bring the offer under suspicion.
  
  
• It is again exceptionally unlikely that any organization would allow employers to pay themselves by deducting a percentage of payments received from clients or customers. That is simply not how legitimate businesses pay their employees and any email that makes such an offer is almost certainly a scam.
  
  
• In spite of the claims made in such emails, there is simply no need for a legitimate organization conducting legal business to hire a person to process payments in the way described. In today's global economy, there are many methods for an organization to quickly and easily process international payments via normal banking procedures. Any message that suggests that it is necessary to convert funds to cash and wire them overseas is very likely to be a scam.

Forewarned with the above information, most recipients should be able to avoid becoming involved in such money laundering scams. By warning other Internet users about these bogus job offers, you can help break the process by which online scammers conduct their nefarious activities.

Last updated: 26th May 2008
First published: 26th May 2008

Write-up by Brett M. Christensen

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