14 stories this week:
SkyCity Adelaide casino accepted bags of ‘soiled’ cash, court documents allege – 7 December 2022
Court documents reveal that cash that was dirty and appeared to have been buried, and money kept in plastic bags, was used in large transactions at the SkyCity Adelaide (SCA) casino. The allegations are part of civil proceedings against SkyCity Adeaide by Australia’s financial crimes watchdog.
AUSTRAC to launch Federal Court civil proceedings against SkyCity Adelaide casino over alleged anti-money-laundering breaches – 7 December 2022
AUSTRAC will issue civil proceedings against SkyCity Adelaide. AUSTRAC alleges serious and systemic non-compliance with anti-money-laundering and counter-terrorism financing laws.
Elizabeth Holmes’s former partner, Ramesh Balwani, given near-13-year prison sentence over Theranos hoax – 8 December 2022
Former Theranos executive Ramesh “Sunny” Balwani has been sentenced to nearly 13 years in prison for his role in the company’s blood-testing hoax. Holmes and Balwani ran Theranos, a company that claimed to have developed a disease-detecting medical scam. The faked technology endangered patients and duped investors.
Embezzlement trial against Markus Braun begins – 8 December 2022
Markus Braun, the former head of disgraced German payment company Wirecard, is charged over the biggest fraud case in German history. Mr Braun has denied embezzling money from Wirecard, and has accused others of running a shadow operation without his knowledge. Wirecard was forced to admit in June 2020 that 1.9 billion euros ($2.9b) were missing from its balance sheet.
Star Entertainment Group fined $100 million over Queensland casino breaches, given 12 months to ‘get their house in order’ – 9 December 2022
Star Entertainment Group has been hit with $100 million in fines and a special manager has been appointed to oversee its Queensland operations following “major failings” at its casinos. The company has also been given 12 months to “get its house in order” or else have its Queensland casino licences temporarily suspended.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-12-09/qld-star-casino-show-cause-100m-fine-licence/101753326
ATO reveals it raided 35 properties suspected of using technology to evade paying tax – 10 December 2022
The (ATO) has revealed it has raided 35 properties nationally as part of a global crackdown on businesses suspected of using or supplying electronic sales suppression tools (ESST). ESST helps businesses permanently delete business transactions, reduce sales values or misrepresent transactions in other ways.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-12-10/tax-raids-taskforce-ato-tech-sales-evasion/101756454
Conman Richard Ayoub jailed over multimillion-dollar scam targeting retirees – 16 December 2022
Richard Ayoub,, an American man living in Australia on a working visa has been jailed for scamming retirees out of about $3 million. Ayoub profited from a scam conning retirees into investing in fake bonds.
Fake myGov profiles are being used to hack ATO accounts. Sue found this out the hard way – 19 December 2022
ABC Investigations has uncovered a vulnerability in the myGov and ATO systems which is being exploited by cybercriminals to defraud the taxpayer. Services Australian told ABC Investigations all that is required to create a myGov account is an email address. No proof of identity is necessary and there is no limit on how many accounts can be opened.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-12-18/ato-tax-hacked-via-mygov-services-australia-exploit/101781656
Australian winery uses new tech to combat wine fraud – 19 December 2022
Grosset Wines, Adelaide, have swapped out their usual bottle caps for ones that use Enseal. The caps have a microchip inserted underneath their top, which consumers can scan with their smartphones to check if the label matches the bottle’s contents. Wine fraud can occur when empty bottles are refilled with other wines and resealed, label details are changed or bottles are labeled with wrong information about variety, region, or vintage.
https://www.daijiworld.com/news/newsDisplay?newsID=1030945
The buried gold, the crumbling fraud case and the billionaires’ tsunami – 20 December 2022
Article describes the Million-dollar fraud case in Orange, were Brian Locke was ousted from the board of the company he founded, had $9 million worth of his shares cancelled and was under police investigation for masterminding a multimillion-dollar fraud. All 133 charges against former Gold and Copper Resources CEO Brian Locke were finally withdrawn.
Foreign national extradited to Qld over alleged scam – 20 December 2022
A young foreign national will be extradited to Queensland over allegations he defrauded $30,000 from an elderly man on the Sunshine Coast. The man was contacted via phone, advising him his accounts had been then the men drove from Sydney to his Sunshine Coast home and pretended to be from his bank and convinced him to hand over bank cards and account details before emptying out his accounts.
https://www.perthnow.com.au/news/foreign-national-extradited-to-qld-over-alleged-scam-c-9222281
FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried signs extradition papers, hearing scheduled for Wednesday – 21 December 2022
Sam Bankman Fried insists the collapse of his $32 million Crypto empire is the result of human error. Federal prosecutor said Mr Bankman-Fried’s actions amounted to “one of the biggest financial frauds in American history”. He is being extradited from the Bahamas to the United States where he faces fraud charges.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-12-21/ftx-sam-bankman-fried-signs-extradition-papers/101796332
ASIC increases focus on cryptocurrency – 21 December 2022
The Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) has increased the number of staff dedicated to cryptocurrency, as high-profile collapses like FTX highlight the danger of the unregulated asset class. Cryptocurrency was currently exempt from regulation, leaving it open to use as a vehicle for money laundering, data breaches and financial crime.
https://www.moneymanagement.com.au/news/policy-regulation/asic-increases-focus-cryptocurrency
Police warning: Aussie parents ordered to pay child’s drug debt – 21 December 2022
The New South Wales Police have warned Aussie parents about a NEW text scam impersonating their children and claiming they need to repay a drug debt. While many Aussies said they managed to avoid falling for the scam, the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission said more than 1,150 Australians fell victim to the so-called ‘Hi Mum’ scam in the first seven months of this year, with total reported losses of $2.6 million.
