Internet Criminals Love to Have Money Wired to Them

Channel3000.com (Wisconsin) did an excellent article about a woman - who after looking for a roommate on roommates.com - was defrauded out of $1400.00 when she wired a "deposit" for an apartment to Canada.

Wire Transfer fraud is becoming a "huge" problem on all sorts of Internet sites, especially those of the auction and job variety.

Some detailed research was put into this article, which revealed the following (sad) statistics:

"A recent survey of seven states found that one-third of all Western Union transfers to Canada were fraud-induced."

"After complaints and threats of lawsuits, Western Union agreed last year to spend $8.1 million on a consumer awareness program to alert consumers to the potential of wire fraud."

Good read from Channel3000.com, here.

BUT Canada isn't the only place the money is sent. There are a lot of sad stories of victims wiring money to West Africa, Europe -- and even within the United States.

If you have been a victim of a fraudulent wire transfer, the right place to report it in the United States is the Federal Trade Commission, here.

In Canada, Phonebusters might be able to help (they have a toll-free U.S. number), here.

To learn more about these types of scams, the Channel3000.com has a link to the FTC page regarding this problem, or Craigslist has a pretty informative page, here.