Dozens of US Poker Professionals Focused in Banking Fraud, Identification Theft Rip-off

Excessive-profile poker gamers are being victimized by a banking rip-off that exploits weaknesses within the on-line on line casino fee processing system, in accordance with the PokerFraudAlert web site.

Todd Witteles has been “quietly investigating” the strategies of a scammer who stole $10,000 from him final month and is urging different victims to contact him. (Picture: PokerNews)

The proprietor of PokerFraudAlert is professional participant Todd Witteles, who’s himself a sufferer. He has to this point has spoken at to least ten gamers who’ve been focused however believes there could also be many extra. These embody Joseph Cheong, Kyna England, David Bach, Sam Panzica, and Clayton Maguire. Others didn’t wish to be recognized and embody a “large title,” Witteles says.

However by focusing on Witteles, the thriller scammer has messed with the improper man.

Since falling sufferer to the rip-off final month, he has been “quietly investigating” behind the scenes. It was solely when he started to understand there have been extra victims within the poker neighborhood, he went public together with his findings on Tuesday.

 Scammer’s M.O.  

On October 20, somebody created an account in Witteles’ title on BetMGM West Virginia, a state the California-based participant has by no means visited.

They had been then in a position to make a $10,000 deposit from his checking account onto the BetMGM platform. They withdrew it instantly to a Venmo Demit Mastercard linked to a phony Venmo account, additionally in Witteles’ title.

However how was the scammer in a position to entry his checking account? Witteles claims they didn’t have to as a result of they had been in a position to exploit a service supplied by World Funds Gaming (GPG) referred to as “VIP Most popular.”

World Funds is an Atlanta, Georgia-based fintech big. GPG is its arm that processes funds for the US land-based and on-line gaming business, based mostly in Las Vegas.

VIP Most popular lets customers deposit funds at quite a few on-line gaming websites and even land-based casinos with out strict safety checks. That’s offered they a have good historical past of transactions processed by GPG on one other gaming website the place they underwent a extra stringent verification course of.  

“[…] VIP Most popular … permits the scammer to entry beforehand used checking account info, offered the sufferer has used eChecks previously, on one among many legalized playing websites,” wrote Witteles. “He makes use of the checking account that was used beforehand to deposit to those websites, which [is] saved and held by the fee processor.”

All they wanted to cross a verification test was Witteles’ title, tackle, and the final 4 digits of his social safety quantity.

‘Extremely Negligent’

The poker professional determined to publicize his findings after seeing a tweet from Cheong.

“Received debited by way of eCheck for $9.8k little over per week in the past by @BetMGMPoker @BetMGMCasino one way or the other,” Cheong wrote. “I don’t even have an account. Appears different poker gamers have additionally been hit by this rip-off (?)”

Witteles is urging extra victims to come back ahead. He says that the widespread denominator in every documented case to this point is that the sufferer had beforehand deposited on a gaming website utilizing an eCheck.

Each single individual victimized, to my information, had the cash stolen from the checking account they used for previous eCheck deposits on legalized playing websites. That is very vital,” Witteles wrote. “When you by no means did eCheck deposits (the place the cash is straight drawn out of your checking account) by way of legalized on-line playing websites, there’s a excessive probability you’ll not be affected by this.”

“…This was extremely negligent on the a part of World Funds to make it really easy to impersonate somebody and steal, and additional negligent on the a part of BetMGM and different legalized playing apps to permit such giant transactions on the identical day the account was opened, together with withdrawals!” he added.

Shadow of Suspicion

Witteles notes it’s suspicious that the perpetrator seems to have “in depth information of World Funds, its buyer base, which websites make the most of them to course of, and one way or the other has entry to the complete private info.”

In an announcement to On line casino.org Thursday, World Funds mentioned it was “aiding regulation enforcement with an investigation into fraudulent accounts arrange at unaffiliated third events utilizing stolen private info.”

“There was no safety breach or fraudulent accounts opened at our gaming enterprise in reference to this investigation,” it added. “The safety of our clients and their purchasers’ info and funds is our prime precedence and we’re working with these third events to make sure any impacted people are refunded.”