Archive | Jun 2008
LifeLock is watching me!
The people at LifeLock are on a serious mission to keep the company’s critics quiet. They even called me this week in an effort to “educate me” on the virtues of LifeLock so that I’d quit criticizing them publicly. So imagine my surprise today at being notified that I had someone new “watching” me on Twitter. [...]
Continue reading...The Lifelock “guarantee”: Talking out of both sides of their mouth
20 Jun 2008
Here and on WalletPop.com (AOL’s personal finance site), I’ve been discussing a company called LifeLock. They purport to help people prevent identity theft. They’re slick marketers and they’ve really capitalized on people’s fears of identity theft. But I don’t like the company or its services. One of the reasons I don’t like the LifeLock service is [...]
Continue reading...A little “Deep Capture” cover-up in the works?
20 Jun 2008
Gary Weiss has a most excellent post on his blog about an apparent cover-up in progress by Patrick Byrne, CEO of Overstock.com (NASDAQ:OSTK). Here’s the deal: For a couple of years now, Patrick has been ranting and raving about conspiracies and Sith Lords and secret fax machines and other oddities related to Naked Short Selling. (Just [...]
Continue reading...Lie about your credentials, win CFO of the Year
19 Jun 2008
Utah Business magazine should be ashamed of itself. Its first ever “CFO of the Year” award went to Gil Fuller, the CFO of Usana Health Sciences (NASDAQ:USNA) who lied about being a CPA. The lies were repeated over and over in SEC filings until Barry Minkow and Fraud Discovery Institute revealed that in fact, Fuller [...]
Continue reading...State audit finds overtime problems
18 Jun 2008
No, I’m not surprised. The Journal Sentinel tipped us off about the horrendous overtime situation with state employees several weeks ago. Now an internal audit confirms abuse of the overtime system, along with pure mismanagement of our tax dollars. No surprise again. The audit found that 59 employees earned over $100,000 in overtime only over a [...]
Continue reading...Does this sound legitimate to you?
18 Jun 2008
Today I got an email from a marketing firm that specializes in helping CPA firms market their services. The sender of the email was inquiring about whether I charge hourly or fixed fees, and what my hourly rates are. He said his client, a CPA firm didn’t want him to mention their name. I thought this [...]
Continue reading...Preserving some Overstock.com history again
18 Jun 2008
From time-to-time, I like to cut and paste from the ever-entertaining stock message boards about Overstock.com (NASDAQ:OSTK). I admit to being a casual observer. I don’t post on those message boards, but do read on occasion. And this exchange was too good to ignore. Plus I like to have the opportunity to read some [...]
Continue reading...Anatomy of a fraud investigation gone wrong
17 Jun 2008
I recently wrote an article for White Collar Crime Fighter, detailing my experience with a company that tried to do a fraud investigation on its own. The investigation was headed up by the president of the small manufacturer, who should have been spending his time on his real job duties, in order to help the [...]
Continue reading...Suspect in title company fraud to be charged with felonies
17 Jun 2008
In March I wrote about a case involving Parkview Title Service and a mom and daughter team that allegedly stole huge sums of money from it. In mid-2006, Bill Molkenthen (the owner of Parkview) believed that Bobbi Moths and her daughter Jamie Wilson were stealing from him, using the money to pay personal bills like [...]
Continue reading...Thousands of victims of Naked Short Selling, but I’m not naming names!
16 Jun 2008
I’m not an expert on Naked Short Selling. Frankly, I’ve just never really been interested in the topic. Does it appear to exist? Yes. Does it appear to be the reason Overstock.com (NASDAQ:OSTK) is doing so poorly and its stock is far below where it was a few years ago? No. I’ve seen no proof [...]
Continue reading...- A new pyramid scheme: United First Financial
- Mary Kay Cosmetics: Destroying half a million women a year
- Ufirst Money Merge Account: Resistance is futile
- The Sarah Palin pregnancy cover-up that wasn't (updated)
- What does Dave Ramsey think about United First Financial
- Vendor talks, Usana squawks
- United First Financial agent compensation plan
- Why can't I pee on my neighbor's lawn?
- $3,500 wasted with United First Financial, per Dave Ramsey
- Searching for Shop to Earn scam
- Tracy Coenen: Oh.. And if you really want to pay $3,800 toward your mortgage...
- Tracy Coenen: Maurice - You’ve fallen for their crap. $5,000 on your...
- maurice: Tracey, Again, I’m not in favor of purchasing software or...
- Tracy Coenen: Well Paul, you apparently agree with me as well. This has been...
- Paul Haley: Has anyone here actually read anything I’ve written any...
- Tracy Coenen: So what Paul is saying is that there is some link between human...
- Lee D: Climate Change is Identity Politics at it’s highest level. And...
- Duped: Good gracious! Sounds like we have another Al Gore here....
- Paul Haley: Lee, There’s no straw man there. Man wasn’t...
- Lee D: Way to mix affirming the consequent with a straw man argument, Paul....
- SEC employees more worried about future careers than actual enforcement?
- “Climate change”: Just another fraud on consumers
- Latest numbers: MPS still sucks
- Property tax sticker shock
- More TARP secrecy
- Bernard Madoff Ponzi scheme investor losses: Recovery?
- Barry Minkow and Fraud Discovery Institute release proof of James Peterson’s (Microsemi Corp) lies
- James Peterson expands the lie; Microsemi board doesn’t care
- Planned Parenthood violating Indiana’s sexual abuse laws
- More public company executives with falsified credentials
About the Author
Tracy Coenen is a forensic accountant and fraud examiner who investigates white collar crimes, including cases of financial statement fraud, embezzlement, tax fraud, and insurance fraud. She is the author of Essentials of Corporate Fraud and more than 100 articles on fraud featured in industry publications.
21 Jun 2008
3 Comments