SFO investigates price rigging in foreign exchange market

The Serious Fraud Office (SFO) has launched a criminal investigation into allegations of price rigging in the £3tn-a-day foreign exchange market. The probe will look into allegations of "fraudulent conduct", the director of the SFO said in a statement. Around 15 authorities internationally are investigating allegations of collusion and price manipulation. It is alleged that traders used online chatrooms to plan the fixing of benchmark prices. The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) said in October it had joined other regulators around the world in scrutinising firms over the potential manipulation of the foreign exchange market.

Jessica Harper admits £2.4m Lloyds Bank fraud

A former Lloyds Bank worker in charge of online security has admitted carrying out a fraud worth more than £2.4m. Jessica Harper, 50, had been accused of submitting false invoices to claim payments between 2007 and 2011. At the time she was working as head of fraud and security for digital banking and made false claims totalling £2,463,750. Harper, of South Croydon, south London, will be sentenced on 21 September. At Southwark Crown Court, Harper admitted a single charge of fraud by abuse of position by submitting false invoices to claim payments. 'A very simple fraud' She also admitted a single charge of transferring criminal property, the money, which she had defrauded from her employers. Harper was arrested on 21 December before being charged in May. Continue reading the main story “ Start Quote Jessica Harper has today been convicted of the type of crime the bank employed her to combat” Sue Patten Crown Prosecution Service Antony Swift, prosecuting, did not open the facts of the case but said it was a "a very simple fraud". He added Harper had already repaid £300,000 and was in the process of selling her house for about £700,000. "That will be some £1m out of £2.5m that's gone missing," he told the judge. Carol Hawley, defending, said: "She appreciates the seriousness and has made full admissions in interview. "She understands perfectly well on the next occasion she will be facing imprisonment of some length." Breach of trust Judge Nicholas Loraine-Smith granted Harper bail on the condition she stays at her current address, obeys a 21:00 to 07:00 curfew and hands in her passport. Sue Patten, head of the Crown Prosecution Service, Central Fraud Division, said: "Jessica Harper has today been convicted of the type of crime the bank employed her to combat. "The evidence in the case was clear and left Harper with little choice but to plead guilty. "In doing so, she has admitted to a huge breach of trust against her former employer." Lloyds is now 39.7% state-owned after being bailed out by the government during the financial crisis.

Shares in Standard Chartered dive after Iran allegations

Shares in Standard Chartered PLC dropped sharply today as investors reacted to US charges that the bank was involved in laundering money for Iran. The charges against Standard Chartered were a shock for a bank which proudly described itself recently as “boring.” Shares were down nearly 20 percent at 1,187 pence at one point in early trading Tuesday on the London Stock Exchange. In Hong Kong, they were down 16.6 percent near the end of the session. New York State Department of Financial Services alleged on Monday that Standard Chartered schemed with the Iranian government to launder $250 billion from 2001 to 2007, leaving the United States' financial system “vulnerable to terrorists.” Standard Chartered said it “strongly rejects” the allegations. In a statement, the bank said “well over 99.9 percent” of the questioned transactions with Iran complied with all regulations, and the exceptions amounted to $14 million. The New York regulator ordered Standard Chartered representatives to appear in New York City on Aug. 15 “to explain these apparent violations of law” and to demonstrate why its license to operate in the State of New York “should not be revoked.” Gary Greenwood, analyst at Shore Capital in London, said the possible revocation of the New York license was of far greater concern than any potential fine, which could run into hundreds of millions of dollars. Standard Chartered's US operation facilitates trade for customers that have operations in both the United States and emerging markets. “Indeed, this is an area of the business that has been highlighted by management for growth,” Greenwood said. “A loss of its US banking license would not only jeopardize part of this profit stream, but the associated reputational damage could also have a severely damaging impact to its operations within emerging markets.” The New York agency alleged that Standard Chartered conspired with Iranian clients to route nearly 60,000 different US dollar payments through Standard Chartered's New York branch “after first stripping information from wire transfer messages used to identify sanctioned countries, individuals and entities.” The New York regulators called the bank a rogue institution and quoted one of its executives as saying: “You (expletive) Americans. Who are you to tell us, the rest of the world, that we're not going to deal with Iranians.” The order also identifies an October 2006 “panicked message” from a London group executive director who worried the transactions could lead to “very serious or even catastrophic reputational damage to the group.” If proven, the scheme would violate state money-laundering laws. The order also accuses the bank of falsifying business records, obstructing governmental administration, failing to report misconduct to the state quickly, evading federal sanctions and other illegal acts. Between 2004 and 2007, about half the period covered by the order, the department claims Standard Chartered hid from and lied about its Iranian transactions to the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. Before 2008, banks were allowed to transact some business with Iran, but only with full reporting and disclosure, the order states. In 2008, the US Treasury Department stopped those transactions because it suspected they helped pay for Iran to develop nuclear weapons and finance terrorist groups including Hamas and Hezbollah. The order states the bank has to provide information and answer questions to determine if any of the funding aided the groups or Iran's nuclear program. Last week, Standard Chartered' chief executive, Peter Sands, boasted that the bank has racked up a 10-year string of record first-half profits “amidst all the turbulence in the global economy and the apparently never-ending turmoil in the world of banking.” “It may seem boring in contrast to what is going on elsewhere, but we see some virtue in being boring,” Sands added.

The biggest fines in British maritime history were handed down to a group of Spanish fishermen on Thursday, for illegal fishing in UK waters.

 Photograph: Robert Ghement/EPA

Some of the biggest fines in British maritime history were handed down to a group of Spanish fishermen on Thursday, for illegal fishing in UK waters.

Two companies owned by the Vidal family were fined £1.62m in total in a Truro court, after a two-day hearing, in which details emerged of falsified log books, failing to register the transfer of fish between vessels, false readings given for weighing fish at sea, and fiddling of fishing quotas.

Judge Graham Cottle said the family were guilty of "wholesale falsification of official documentation" that amounted to a "systematic, repeated and cynical abuse of the EU fishing quota system over a period of 18 months".

He said: "[This was a] flagrant, repeated and long term abuse of regulations. The fish targeted [hake] was at that time a species of fish on the verge if collapse and adherence to quotas was seen as crucial to the survival of the species."

The Spanish fishing vessels had been sailing under UK flags and were landing fish based on quotas given to British fishermen under the EU's common fisheries policy. Two vessels were involved, but the companies own several other large vessels, capable of industrial-scale fishing.

The offending fishermen, who admitted their guilt earlier this year, were not in court to hear him, having been given leave to return to Spain last night. The offences, dating from 2009 and 2010, relate to two companies, Hijos De Vidal Bandin SA and Sealskill Limited, both owned by the Vidal family. They were fined £925,000 on a confiscation order, plus £195,000 in costs, and an additional fine of £250,000 levied on each of the two companies. Two skippers who were acting under the family's instructions were fined £5,000 each.

Ariana Densham, oceans campaigner at Greenpeace, who was present for the trial and judgement, said that the fines, while welcome, did not go far enough. "This group of people should never be allowed near UK fishing quota again," she said. "The Vidal's right to fish should be removed completely."

She said the offences showed the vulnerability of the EU's fishing quota system to fraud. "The system that allowed this to happen needs to be fixed," she said. "This case is not a one off. It's a symptom of Europe's farcical fishing rules. The Vidals were permitted to fish under UK flags, using UK quota, and receive huge EU subsidies, with none of the proceeds ever feeding back into the UK economy. The system is skewed in favour of rich, powerful, industrial-scale fishing companies, when really it should be supporting low-impact, sustainable fishermen."

There are currently moves under way in Brussels by the fisheries commissioner, Maria Damanaki, to reform the EU's common fisheries policy. The proposed reforms – which include the ending of the wasteful practice of discarding healthy and edible fish at sea – have met stiff opposition, particularly from the French and Spanish fishing industries. Spain has the biggest fishing fleet in Europe and receives the lion's share of the subsidies available for fishing within the EU. A historic agreement was reached among member states last month on the proposals, but they must now pass the European parliament, which is expected to consider the proposals later this year.

Libor scandal: two London traders suspended from Mitsubishi

The traders, named as Christian Schluep and Paul Robson by sources, are thought to have been suspended two weeks ago on questions of their action when they worked at the Dutch bank. The suspensions are the latest advance of the investigation being conducted by regulators in Britain, America, Canada, Europe and Japan into supicions that the Libor (London Interbank Offered Rate) has been repeatedly rigged. Rabobank is a member of the panel that sets Libor, the rate at which banks will lend to each other and which underlies financial contracts from mortgages to complex derivatives. A spokesman for Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group in London could not be reached but it understood the probe does not relate to the traders’ work for at BTMU, the commercial banking unit of the the Japanese bank. A spokeswoman told Reuters: “We continue to co-operate fully with various authorities’ investigations ... The suspension of these two individuals is not connected with their conduct at BTMU.”

Regulators Charge Futures Brokerage Firm With Fraud

The Commodity Futures Trading Commission on Tuesday charged a futures firm and its chief executive with fraud and making false statements after nearly $200 million in customer funds went missing. The regulator is seeking a restraining order against the Peregrine Financial Group, also called P.F.G., to prevent the destruction of any information that may be needed in the course of the investigation. The C.F.T.C. is also asking a federal court to appoint a receiver for the firm and freeze its assets. A day earlier, the chairman and chief executive, Russell Wasendorf Sr., tried to commit suicide outside of the firm’s offices in Cedar Falls, Iowa. The Federal Bureau of Investigation is investigating the matter, according to a spokeswoman for the Omaha office, Sandy Breault. Ms. Breault indicated that the Chicago office of the agency might also get involved. News of the missing money surfaced Monday, when the firm’s primary regulator, the National Futures Association, determined that an account that was supposed to have $225 million of customer money actually held just $5 million. A further review of records showed that the firm had been falsifying its records as far back as 2010, the regulator said in its complaint. In February 2010, an account that purported to have some $218 million in reality contained just $10 million. “P.F.G. and Wasendorf have used customer funds for purposes other than those intended by its customers, and consequently, have misappropriated these funds,” the complaint states. “The whereabouts of the funds is currently unknown.” How the money came to be siphoned off from customer accounts remains a mystery, particularly in the wake of increased scrutiny on the futures industry after the collapse of MF Global. Article Tools FACEBOOK TWITTER GOOGLE+ EMAIL SHARE PRINT Related Links The news release The complaint After the fiasco at MF Global, which left customers missing more than $1 billion, regulators vowed to ensure the safety of customer money. Both the N.F.A. and the C.F.T.C. conducted reviews of futures firms to reassure investors. The regulators granted them all clean bills of health. P.F.G. is a well-known firm in the tight-knit community of futures brokerage firm. Mr. Wasendorf was considered by many to be a pioneer of the industry, having been registered with the C.F.T.C. since 1992. He fully owned P.F.G., and his son, Russell Wasendorf Jr., served as president of the company. On Monday, the N.F.A., which is an industry self-regulator, moved to halt operations at the firm immediately after discovering the shortfall. In a report filed late Monday, the National Futures Association said that bank statements from U.S. Bank, where customer money was held, could have been fabricated.

Serious Fraud Office launches Libor investigation

The Serious Fraud Office (SFO) has confirmed that it has formally launched a criminal investigation into the rigging of inter-bank lending rates. Earlier this week, it said it was considering whether prosecutions would be possible. An SFO spokesperson confirmed that a dedicated case team had now started work. Its involvement follows an investigation by US and UK regulators into the manipulation of Libor. That resulted in a record fine for Barclays, who last week agreed to pay £290m in penalties after its traders tried to rig inter-bank lending rates, sometimes working with staff at other financial institutions. Regulators are continuing to look into possible rate manipulation at other banks, while the US Department of Justice is carrying out its own criminal investigations. The SFO would not say whom it is investigating. Its short statement said only: "The SFO Director David Green QC has today decided formally to accept the Libor matter for investigation." Continue reading the main story Serious Fraud Office Independent government agency established in 1988 Deals with complex, high value fraud cases Average length of case is 4-6 years Carries out investigations in England, Wales and Northern Ireland. In Scotland, this is done by the Crown Office's Serious and Organised Crime Division The Libor affair, described by the prime minister as a scandal, has led to the resignation of three of Barclays' most senior executives in a matter of days, including chief executive Bob Diamond. He appeared before MPs on the Treasury Select Committee this week, when he called the behaviour of those responsible for Libor rigging at the bank "reprehensible". Regulators in the UK and the US found that Barclays staff had tried to affect rates over a number of years, first for profit and then to reduce concerns about how much it was being affected by the financial crisis. The SFO is responsible for investigating allegations of serious and complex frauds. It considers whether to prosecute using a number of criteria, including whether it is a matter of public concern, and whether the value of any fraud is more than £1m.

Times are desperate in Spain. The Sun is setting on expats' Costa dreams

 

It was sundowner time at the Cantina tapas bar in the picturesque village of Frigiliana, a few miles inland from the Costa del Sol town of Nerja. Inside, local men were watching bullfighting on television and smoking cigars in quiet contravention of the smoking ban. Outside, expatriate Britons were discussing the vagaries of living in Spain while downing glasses of tinto de verano, the popular summer drink of red wine and lemonade. Mark Jones, who runs his own gardening and pool maintenance company, had spent two days queuing at the local municipal office to renew his residence permit. "I got there at 9am on the first day and my number was 26; by lunchtime they were only up to number 6 and they close at 2pm," he complained. "You have to renew every bit of paper here every few years but I can't afford two days off to queue in an office. There are no staff now because of the cuts, so it all takes longer. It's like everywhere – as soon as the recession hits, it's the immigrants who cop it worst."  Conversation turned to a local couple, who are desperate to leave Spain but who can't because their house is still unsold after four years on the market - despite dropping the asking price from €1 million to €750,000. In 1992 the BBC spent millions of pounds launching an ill-fated soap opera, Eldorado, following the fortunes of British expats on the Costa del Sol. The project flopped and was cancelled a year later. Now, 20 years later, the real-life diaspora is experiencing an equally disastrous end to its Iberian dream. Times are desperate in Spain. More than a million people took the streets earlier this month to protest at budget cuts, 24 per cent unemployment and the rising cost of living. The price of milk and bread has risen by 48 per cent during the last year, according to a recent study, and of potatoes by 116 per cent. Electricity bills are up 11 per cent while property prices are in free fall; they have declined for 15 consecutive quarters and are 41 per cent lower than in 2006. Several of its banks are faltering: this weekend Spain's government is preparing to pump a further €19 billion into Bankia, the country's fourth-largest lender, in the biggest single bank bailout in the country's history. Trading in the bank's shares was suspended on Friday until negotiations over the rescue were complete. Santander, Europe's largest bank, was among 11 Spanish financial institutions to be downgraded by the credit rating agency Standard and Poor earlier this month; and there's no sign of anything like economic recovery on the horizon. Expats are finding life hard in a country where they once basked in a cheaper way of life. Around one million Britons spend part or all of the year in Spain, but thousands are now returning home – and more want to, but say they can't afford to because their property is no longer worth what they paid for it. For the first time since 1998, Spain recorded a drop in foreign residents last year, according to newly released figures. With its narrow cobbled streets, whitewashed houses and children riding horses down the main road, Frigiliana lives up to most tourists' idea of an authentic Spanish village. But appearances can be deceptive. Out of its 3,000-strong population, 1,280 are foreign nationals including 700 Britons, making the village one of the most expat-dominated in Spain. The school advertises itself as bilingual. The British population is so large that the local council pays Kevin Wright, a former travel rep from Leicestershire who has lived in Spain for more than 20 years, to run a "foreigners' department". He helps expats deal with everything from local business permits to burst pipes and land disputes with neighbours, and has noticed changes since the eurozone crisis began. "Before, I was getting 10 newbies a week moving here from the UK; now I get one," he said. "Some Brits have lived here for 20 years but now families move out here then six, eight months later pack up and go back because they can't find work, or didn't realise what the cost of living would be." Mr Wright says many Britons fail to learn Spanish or to assimilate, so that the community becomes dependent on itself – to its cost. "People think they can set themselves up doing business to other Brits, like finance or house sales and rentals, or pool maintenance, gardening and cleaning. "But the property market isn't there any more and people have cut back and do their own maintenance, so there's less work." In desperate economic times, the expat community is increasingly vulnerable to financial trickery. "The worst people for scamming you are other Brits," said Gary Smith, a builder, who emigrated two years ago. "You trust them more but they just take your money for an investment and you never see a penny." Elderly residents are particularly vulnerable. The exchange rate - still far less favourable than five years ago - has meant British pensions and other income in sterling do not stretch as far as they once did. Julia Hilling moved from the UK to Fuengirola, along the coast from Frigiliana, 20 years ago with her husband. They bought a spacious, three-bedroomed apartment with two balcony patios in an upmarket area, overlooking the town's castle. Six years ago, Mrs Hilling, by then a widow aged 83, was persuaded by an independent financial adviser to take out a full mortgage on the apartment. She was told the equity raised would be invested, risk-free, to provide an income, while the mortgage would help offset Spain's 34 per cent inheritance tax when she died. Now 89, Mrs Hilling has never seen any return on her money, owes more than €300,000 to Rothschild Bank on the mortgage and relies on handouts from her children to stay in Spain. "It's devastating," she said. "The man was British, very charming, and said there was no risk. My children said 'Mummy, please don't do this', but I needed the extra income. Now I'm fighting for my life and my home." She is one of more than 100 mainly elderly British expats who have banded together in a Spanish court action to have their mortgages voided, arguing they were mis-sold. Rothschild and several Scandinavian banks also named in the legal action claim the financial advisers are to blame; and the advisers, who are not regulated in Spain as they are in Britain, insist the risk was mentioned in the small print. In a country fighting for its own survival, Spanish politicians are not unduly concerned with the plight of British residents, particularly when many are retired so do not actively contribute to the national economy. Spain's government is currently involved in a dispute with Britain over extent of free health care for Britons under EU law and there are moves to force them to pay 10 per cent of their prescription costs. But for some, returning home remains unthinkable. Former fitness instructor and gym owner Jo Morrison, 49, moved to Spain from London with her partner Lloyd 11 years ago. In 2008 she sold her house in Putney so she could open a gym in Nerja but the project failed after her business partner pulled out, and then the global financial crisis erupted. She now works as a cleaner while renting a one-bedroom home. "Sometimes we've gone without food and I still can't believe that I don't have my house or any savings any more," she said. "But Spain is my home now. I'd rather sleep on the beach than go back to the UK."

EU cookie implementation deadline is today

A year after its implementation in May 2011, the European Commission's Privacy and Electronic Communications Directive will finally start to be enforced as of tonight, meaning visitors to websites are required to be informed of, and given choice over, the site's intentions to store their data in cookies. Though there has been fierce opposition to the directive, some companies, such as the BBC, Channel 4 and the Guardian, have now begun implementing measures that range from multiple user choices in the level of information shared with the site, to a single message informing the user that, by continuing to browse, they have automatically agreed to have their information stored. Further reading EU cookie law is a 'restraint to trade online', says online retailer Most UK organisations not compliant with EU cookie law New EU cookie law set to come into force But the majority of companies, it is widely reported, will miss tonight's deadline. While the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) still disagrees that a "one size fits all" policy of standardisation is not the way forward when enforcing cookie legislation, some believe such a framework is the only way forward. Society for engineering and technology professionals, the Institution of Engineering & Technology said, "The implementation of this directive is likely to prove very variable until the introduction of a set of standards on the best way to provide a balance between easy browsing and personal privacy. "We had hoped that more progress would have been made on achieving this in the 12 month implementation delay that the Information Commissioner, Christopher Graham, gave British organisations."

Google plans to warn more than half a million users of a computer infection that may knock their computers off the Internet this summer.

Unknown to most of them, their problem began when international hackers ran an online advertising scam to take control of infected computers around the world. In a highly unusual response, the FBI set up a safety net months ago using government computers to prevent Internet disruptions for those infected users. But that system will be shut down July 9 -- killing connections for those people.

The FBI has run an impressive campaign for months, encouraging people to visit a website that will inform them whether they're infected and explain how to fix the problem. After July 9, infected users won't be able to connect to the Internet.

LONG ARM OF SCOFFLAW

An online ad scam is having some unintended ramifications: The fix may prevent as many as 360,000 from getting online. Several sites will show if you're infected:

DNS Changer Working Group: can discern whether you’re infected and explain how to fix the problem.

DNSChanger Eye Chart: if the site goes red, you’re in harm’s way. Green means clean.

The FBI website: type in the IP address of your DNS server to find out if it is infected.

Read more on how to stay safe

On Tuesday, May 22, Google announced it would throw its weight into the awareness campaign, rolling out alerts to users via a special message that will appear at the top of the Google search results page for users with affected computers, CNET reported. 

“We believe directly messaging affected users on a trusted site and in their preferred language will produce the best possible results,” wrote Google security engineer Damian Menscher in a post on the company’s security blog.

“If more devices are cleaned and steps are taken to better secure the machines against further abuse, the notification effort will be well worth it,” he wrote.

The challenge, and the reason for the awareness campaigns: Most victims don't even know their computers have been infected, although the malicious software probably has slowed their web surfing and disabled their antivirus software, making their machines more vulnerable to other problems.

Last November, when the FBI and other authorities were preparing to take down a hacker ring that had been running an Internet ad scam on a massive network of infected computers, the agency realized this may become an issue.

"We started to realize that we might have a little bit of a problem on our hands because ... if we just pulled the plug on their criminal infrastructure and threw everybody in jail, the victims of this were going to be without Internet service," said Tom Grasso, an FBI supervisory special agent. "The average user would open up Internet Explorer and get `page not found' and think the Internet is broken."

On the night of the arrests, the agency brought in Paul Vixie, chairman and founder of Internet Systems Consortium, to install two Internet servers to take the place of the truckload of impounded rogue servers that infected computers were using. Federal officials planned to keep their servers online until March, giving everyone opportunity to clean their computers.

But it wasn't enough time.

A federal judge in New York extended the deadline until July.

Now, said Grasso, "the full court press is on to get people to address this problem." And it's up to computer users to check their PCs.

'We started to realize that we might have a little bit of a problem on our hands...'

- Tom Grasso, an FBI supervisory special agent

This is what happened:

Hackers infected a network of probably more than 570,000 computers worldwide. They took advantage of vulnerabilities in the Microsoft Windows operating system to install malicious software on the victim computers. This turned off antivirus updates and changed the way the computers reconcile website addresses behind the scenes on the Internet's domain name system.

The DNS system is a network of servers that translates a web address -- such as http://www.foxnews.com -- into the numerical addresses that computers use. Victim computers were reprogrammed to use rogue DNS servers owned by the attackers. This allowed the attackers to redirect computers to fraudulent versions of any website.

The hackers earned profits from advertisements that appeared on websites that victims were tricked into visiting. The scam netted the hackers at least $14 million, according to the FBI. It also made thousands of computers reliant on the rogue servers for their Internet browsing.

When the FBI and others arrested six Estonians last November, the agency replaced the rogue servers with Vixie's clean ones. Installing and running the two substitute servers for eight months is costing the federal government about $87,000.

The number of victims is hard to pinpoint, but the FBI believes that on the day of the arrests, at least 568,000 unique Internet addresses were using the rogue servers. Five months later, FBI estimates that the number is down to at least 360,000. The U.S. has the most, about 85,000, federal authorities said. Other countries with more than 20,000 each include Italy, India, England and Germany. Smaller numbers are online in Spain, France, Canada, China and Mexico.

Vixie said most of the victims are probably individual home users, rather than corporations that have technology staffs who routinely check the computers.

FBI officials said they organized an unusual system to avoid any appearance of government intrusion into the Internet or private computers. And while this is the first time the FBI used it, it won't be the last.

"This is the future of what we will be doing," said Eric Strom, a unit chief in the FBI's Cyber Division. "Until there is a change in legal system, both inside and outside the United States, to get up to speed with the cyber problem, we will have to go down these paths, trail-blazing if you will, on these types of investigations."

Now, he said, every time the agency gets near the end of a cyber case, "we get to the point where we say, how are we going to do this, how are we going to clean the system" without creating a bigger mess than before

Under European Union law, Greece cannot leave the euro.

That is the theory. But in practice, any protection the law offers investors could be difficult to enforce, according to lawyers trying to protect their corporate clients against the upheaval sure to follow if Greece defaults on its debts and adopts a new currency. So their advice is blunt: Remove cash and other liquid assets from Greece and prepare to take a short-term hit on any other investments. “My personal view is that it is irrational for anyone, whether a corporation or an individual, to be leaving money in Greek financial institutions, so long as there is a credible prospect of a euro zone exit,” said Ian Clark, a partner in London for White & Case, a global law firm that has a team of 10 attorneys focusing on the issue. Several multinational corporations have already taken the same view. Vodafone, the mobile phone operator, and GlaxoSmithKline, the pharmaceuticals firm, say they are “sweeping” money out of Greece and into British banks each evening. This applies not just to Greece but to most other euro nations, although Glaxo says it still keeps money in Germany. Corporate attorneys say looking to E.U. law provides only approximate guidance on whether Greece could stop using the euro while remaining in the Union. Although the E.U. prides itself on basing decisions on strict interpretation of the legal texts in its governing treaty and other legislation, the rules on euro membership have proved flexible. For example, while all 27 E.U. nations are supposedly obliged to join the single currency, once they meet certain economic criteria, Britain and Denmark were able to negotiate the option of retaining their own currencies. Sweden is one of the nations technically obliged to join the euro, but since a national referendum opposed the idea in 2003, no one has pressed the country to do so. Similarly, while leaving the euro might, legally, mean quitting the union itself, most experts see this as a technicality that can be circumvented as well. “The treaty doesn’t cover the question of what would happen if a country were to leave the euro and return to its previous currency,” said Stephen Weatherill, Jacques Delors Professor of European Law at Oxford University. “In the absence of any provision, there is plenty of space for European governments to concoct a solution, adopt it and for it to be legally enforceable,” he added. “In general, you can do anything you like, so long as you do not breach pre-existing international obligations.” The mechanics of leaving the euro would surely lead Greece to impose so-called capital controls to stem the flight of money from a currency destined to be devalued. Again, such controls look impossible under E.U. law. But Mr. Weatherill thinks that a loophole allowing for the protection of public security could be invoked. Mr. Clark, of White & Case, a global law firm, points to a clause in Article 65 of the treaty that says that the pledge on free movement should not prevent countries from taking measures “which are justified on grounds of public policy or public security.” Mr. Clark and his team serve clients that include financial institutions like BNP Paribas and hedge funds. In February, Andrew Witty, the chief executive of GlaxoSmithKline, said: “We don’t leave any cash in most European countries” except Germany. Tens of millions of pounds flow into accounts in Britain every day, he said. But, apart from trying to ensure that debts are paid promptly and therefore in euros, legal options for companies are limited. Contracts covered by Greek law, particularly for services delivered in Greece, provide little protection against the currency’s being redenominated and devalued — a development regarded as unlikely until recently. “Greece would, through its laws, be able to amend contracts governed by Greek law or to be performed within the territory of Greece,” Mr. Clark said. “It is the governing law and the place of performance of the contract that is most important.” International contracts, which might be covered by English, German or Swiss law, would be more likely to be honored in the designated currency, though in some cases the wording of the legal document may be vague. And even if the law is on their side, companies would find that to extract payment from a Greek company, they would need a judge in Greece to enforce a ruling from a foreign court. “Enforcement of foreign judgments is harder or easier from country to country within the E.U.,” Mr. Clark said. “Greece has always had a reputation of being a difficult place in which to enforce judgments, from a practical perspective.” That means that international trading partners are likely to share in any losses that accompany a Greek exit from the euro. “International businesses that have long-term interests in Greece are going to have to be pragmatic and probably, in the short term, give some dispensation to their Greek counterparties, rather than trying to enforce the terms of contracts that cannot be performed,” Mr. Clark said.

Former Lloyds worker Jessica Harper in £2.5m fraud charge

A former head of security at Lloyds Bank has been charged in connection with an alleged £2.5m fraud. Jessica Harper, 50, of Croydon, south London, is accused of submitting false invoices to claim payments, between September 2008 and December 2011. At the time she was working as head of fraud and security for digital banking and allegedly made false claims totalling £2,463,750. Ms Harper will appear at Westminster Magistrates' Court on 31 May. She has been charged with one count of fraud by abuse of position. The bank, which is now 39.7% state-owned after being bailed out by the government during the financial crisis, refused to comment on the charging of Ms Harper. A Metropolitan Police spokesman said she was arrested on 21 December 2011 by officers from its fraud squad. Andrew Penhale, from the Crown Prosecution Service's Central Fraud Group, said: "The charge relates to an allegation that between 1 September 2008 and 21 December 2011, Jessica Harper dishonestly and with the intention of making a gain for herself, abused her position as an employee of Lloyds Banking Group, in which she was expected to safeguard the financial interests of Lloyds Banking Group, by submitting false invoices to claim payments totalling £2,463,750.88, to which she was not entitled. "This decision to prosecute was taken in accordance with the Code for Crown Prosecutors. "We have determined that there is a realistic prospect of conviction and a prosecution is in the public interest."

Client had 'blind trust' in accountants, fraud trial told

Napier businessman remembers making “big payments” after being invoiced by his accountant, but “can’t recall why”, Wellington High Court has heard. Edward Roberts, a contractor who worked for the Whirinaki mill and also owns a scrap metal business, is one of 48 witnesses giving evidence in the fraud trial of Wellington accountants David Ingram Rowley and Barrie James Skinner. Mr Roberts apologised to Justice Stephen Kos as he left the courtroom. “I am sorry that I am not very intelligent on this, but I can only tell you what I honestly believe,” he said. Messrs Rowley and Skinner face more than 100 charges of fraudulently using a document to obtain a pecuniary advantage, attempting to pervert the course of justice and tax evasion. Crown lawyer Dale La Hood alleges the pair used their roles as directors of Wellington accountancy firm Tax Planning Services to set up sham transactions to create tax deductions and credits for 27 clients, including lawyers and company directors. These allegedly took place through MCK Holdings Ltd and included a complicated scheme in which clients paid deposits on properties and received their money back shortly afterwards. The scheme was presented to clients as a legitimate way to reduce tax liability, and even if they were aware of the alleged scam - which would see them benefitting from tax advantages - it would be difficult to prove criminal intent. The Crown accuses Messrs  Rowley and Skinner of instructing clients what to tell an IRD investigation about the transactions later, and many only learned then that the transactions involved property deals. The pair are also accused of invoicing clients, usually for consultancy or subcontracting work, which never existed. However, it was difficult for Mr La Hood to get a clear answer from Mr Roberts about $290,000 worth of subcontracting work he was charged for - Mr Roberts either couldn’t recall what had happened, or responded: “I relied on Barrie [Mr Skinner]." “I relied on Barrie 100%. I had nobody else to rely on, that was it really,” Mr Roberts told the court. He told Justice Kos whenever Mr Skinner visited him, on average five or six times a year, Mr Roberts would make out cheques because he “trusted what Barrie was doing”. When Mr Roberts was eventually left with a $620,000 tax bill, Mr Skinner told him he would “sort it out” and Mr Roberts would only be liable for $250,000. Mr Roberts was also advised to put a deposit on a building on Boulcott St, Wellington, after which he would receive the bulk of the money back. However, he was unable to give any details about the arrangements, or when discussions took place about the deal, and while he “didn’t understand it”, he “hoped what Barrie was doing was above board”. “We were going to put a deposit down and as soon as the building was built, we would sell and maybe make 10% to 15% on the deposit price. At least that was my understanding of it,” he says. Software developer Douglas Leyser, who had used the services of Tax Service Planing for 17 years, told the court he had no recollection of whether or not he had received a $20,000 payment after putting a $29,000 deposit on an apartment in Taranaki St, Wellington. “I told the IRD that during that time I was under an awful lot of pressure and it would have been something I would not have given a lot of thought to, to be honest,” Mr Leyser says. The court will be interested to hear the testimony of convicted fraudster, Shaan Stevens, the former Wellington Free Ambulance chairman who is one of  33 witnesses still to be called to give evidence. Stevens last year pleaded guilty to 22 charges of fraud, tax evasion and attempting to pervert the course of justice in a related case. He was struck off the New Zealand Institute of Chartered Accountants register last week as a result of his convictions. Stevens is believed to have referred clients to Messrs Skinner and Rowley while he was an accountant at Guinness Gallagher, allegedly knowing they would take part in the alleged fraud. He is expected to testify later this week.

Questions linger about high-profile ‘marriage fraud’ case

It was the most highly publicized case of “marriage fraud” in recent memory: A Canadian woman abandoned by her Guinean husband only a month after he arrived in this country, the revelation that he had previously fathered a child in Africa, and his subsequent deportation for not declaring the existence of a dependent. But paternity tests may now show the so-called fraudster was in fact not the child’s father — and that the man portrayed as a cad may have been exiled from his new life without good reason. Eight days before Fode Mohamed (Akra) Soumah left for his homeland in February, paternity test results were given to both the Canadian Border Services Agency and Citizenship and Immigration Canada officials. And Soumah’s second Canadian wife, Cassandre Blier, questions why no stay of deportation was granted so this new evidence could be reviewed.

Global Payments Breach Fueled Prepaid Card Fraud

Debit card accounts stolen in a recent hacker break-in at card processor Global Payments have been showing up in fraud incidents at retailers in Las Vegas and elsewhere, according to officials from one bank impacted by the fraud. At the beginning of March 2012, Danbury, Conn. based Union Savings Bank began seeing an unusual pattern of fraud on a dozen or so debit cards it had issued, noting that most of the cards had recently been used in the same cafe at a nearby private school. When the bank determined that the school was a customer of Global Payments, it contacted Visa to alert the card association of a possible breach at the Atlanta-based processor, according to Doug Fuller, Union Savings Bank’s chief risk officer. That’s when USB heard from Tony Higgins, then a fraud investigator at Vons, a grocery chain in Southern California and Nevada owned by Safeway Inc. According to Fuller, Higgins said the fraudsters were coming to the stores to buy low-denomination Safeway branded prepaid cards, and then encoding debit card accounts issued by USB onto the magnetic stripe on the backs of the prepaid cards. The thieves then used those cards to purchase additional prepaid cards with much higher values, which were then used to buy electronics and other high-priced goods from other retailers. “Higgins said, ‘You have a problem,’” Fuller recalled, of a phone conversation the bank had with Higgins in early March. “He said he had a slew of these people going through their Vons and Safeway stores exchanging cards. He had them on surveillance tape, knew where they were from and everything.” Higgins told USB that the fraud he was seeing was mostly in Las Vegas, but that there also was some fraudulent card activity in neighboring states in the southwest. “He had a theory that these guys came from Los Angeles and San Diego to Vegas just to make these transactions, and then went back,” Fuller said. The fraud described by Higgins matched the unauthorized activity that they had seen stemming from accounts used at the private school cafeteria. Fuller said Visa has alerted Union Savings Bank that about 1,000 debit accounts it issued were compromised in the Global Payments breach — including the dozen or so card accounts that initially prompted USB to investigate. USB officials say the bank has suffered approximately $75,000 in fraudulent charges, and that it has so far spent close to $10,000 reissuing customer cards. Other banks notified by Higgins had much higher losses, Fuller said. “Mr. Higgins told us that the thieves also hit Bank of Oklahoma and Fulton Bank of New Jersey. He said Fulton was hit very hard by these guys, to the tune of about one thousand [stolen card accounts] each week.” Higgins could not be reached for comment. Safeway officials confirmed that he retired from the company last month, but declined to discuss Higgins’ work or the incidents that prompted him to alert USB and other financial institutions affected by the Global Payments breach. Neither the Bank of Oklahoma nor Fulton Bank responded to repeated requests for comment. The experience of Union Savings Bank illustrates how fraudsters can extract value from debit cards even if they only have some of the data associated with the accounts. Initial alerts about the breach from Visa and MasterCard stated that the breach at Global Payments compromised both Track 1 and Track 2 data from affected card accounts, meaning thieves could produce counterfeit versions of the cards and possibly commit other acts of identity theft against cardholders. Global Payments claims that only Track 2 data was taken, and that cardholder names, addresses and other data were were not obtained by the criminals. Yet, as USB’s story shows, the data on Track 2 alone was enough for the crooks to encode the card number and expiration date onto any cards equipped with a magnetic stripe. The cards could then be used at any merchant that accepts signature debit — transactions that do not require the cardholder to enter his or her PIN. Visa and MasterCard each have revoked their certification of Global Payments as a compliant card processor. Global Payments said it is still investigating the cause and extent of the incident. The company maintains that fewer than 1.5 million card accounts were stolen, but some in the industry now believe more than 7 million card accounts may have been compromised. Meanwhile, the card associations keep broadening the window of time in which hackers likely had access to the processor’s network. Initially, Visa and MasterCard said the breach window at Global Payments was between January and February 2012, but in the latest round of alerts sent to banks affected by the breach, the card brands warned that the breach dates back to at least early June 2011. USB’s experience also raises fresh questions about the timing of the breach discovery. Global Payments says it self-discovered and self-reported the breach on March 8, but Fuller said his bank figured out Global Payments was having an issue and reported the fraud before that. “Global is saying this was self-discovered, but already knew it was them at the beginning of March, because within 48 hours of a customer telling us they were having problems, we figured out it was Global and alerted Visa,” Fuller said. “We’re are going to put Global on notice that we hold them accountable, because we’re bleeding here. Granted, a seventy-five thousand dollar loss isn’t the end of the world, but when you have a large institution like Global that doesn’t want to accept responsibility about what’s happened, that’s sort of annoying.”

Gas canister man storms office

One of the country's busiest shopping streets has been closed as a man wearing gas canisters stormed into an office and threatened to blow himself up, it was reported. Tottenham Court Road in central London was closed after police received emergency calls at midday. Scotland Yard sent a hostage negotiator to the scene amid reports the man had held people hostage inside the building several floors up. Pictures emerged of computer and office equipment being thrown through one of the office windows. A police spokesman said it was "too early to say if the suspect was armed or indeed had taken any hostages" but businesses and nearby buildings were evacuated. Joaqam Ramus, who works at nearby Cafe Fresco, said before being evacuated: "There was talk of a bomb and somebody having a hostage in a building. "All Tottenham Court Road is closed and so are we - the police told us to shut. "We don't know what it is but it seems someone has a hostage."

Busy London street evacuated over ‘hostage situation’

POLICE have been called to a potential hostage situation after Tottenham Court Road in London, one of the country’s busiest shopping streets, was closed. Businesses and shoppers were evacuated from the area at midday. Scotland Yard said it had sent a negotiator to the scene after reports of a man throwing furniture out of a window several floors up. A spokesman said it was “too early to say if the suspect was armed or indeed had taken any hostages”. Joaqam Ramus, who works at nearby Cafe Fresco, said before being evacuated: “There was talk of a bomb and somebody having a hostage in a building. “All Tottenham Court Road is closed and so are we - the police told us to shut. “We don’t know what it is but it seems someone has a hostage.” A spokesman for Transport for London could not confirm details of the ongoing operation but confirmed they were “aware of an incident”. Staff from news website The Huffington Post UK were evacuated from their building after a man reportedly wearing a gas canister threatened to blow himself up in the adjoining building, they said. People near the scene reported shots being fired and said computers and equipment had been thrown out of the windows of the office block housing the Huffington Post. Huffington Post UK executive editor Stephen Hull posted a video on Twitter of an office worker who saw the man enter the building. Abby Baafi, 27, the head of training and operations at Advantage, a company which offers HGV courses, told Mr Hull the man had targeted her offices and was currently holding four men hostage. In a video posted on YouTube, she said: “What happened is, we were in the office and someone came in. He asked him what his name was and he said it was Michael Green. “I recognised him because he was one of our previous customers but he is not quite stable - mentally stable. “He turned up, strapped up with gasoline cylinders, and threatened to blow up the office. “He said he doesn’t care about his life. He doesn’t care about anything, he is going to blow up everybody. “He was specifically looking for me but I said ‘My name’s not Abby’ and he let me go.” Ms Baafi said the man failed the HGV training course and wanted his money back.

Credit card fraud websites shut down on three continents

Three men have been arrested and 36 criminal websites selling credit card information and other personal data shut down as part of a two-year international anti-fraud operation, police have confirmed. The Serious Organised Crime Agency (SOCA), working with the FBI and US Department of Justice, as well as authorities in Germany; the Netherlands; Ukraine; Australia and Romania, swooped after identifying the sites as specialising in selling card and bank details in bulk. The move comes as a blow to what is a growing black market for stolen financial data. Detectives estimated that the card information seized could have been used to extract more than £500m in total by fraudsters. SOCA claimed it has recovered more than two and a half million items of compromised personal and financial information over the past two years. “The authorities have shut down 36 websites but it is difficult to know how many other people had access to that data. They could spring back up somewhere else if a gang is not eradicated completely,” said Graham Cluley of internet security firm Sophos. He added: “This is big business and, just as in any legitimate company there are people who specialise in different things, so there are those who actually get their hands on the personal data and those who sell it on; they are not often the same person.” An investigation by The Independent last summer found that scammers were making a “comfortable living” getting their hands on sensitive information and selling it online. Card details were being offered for sale for between 4p and £60 per card – depending on the quality – according to one source in the business. Some cards would be sold with incomplete or unreliable information; others ready to use. Some of the card details for sale on the websites shut down by SOCA were being sold for as little as £2 each. Investigators said that the alleged fraudsters were using Automated Vending Carts, which allowed them to sell large quantities of stolen data. They are said to be a driver of the growth in banking fraud over the last 18 months because of the speed with which stolen data can be sold. Lee Miles, Head of Cyber Operations for SOCA said: “This operation is an excellent example of the level of international cooperation being focused on tackling online fraud. Our activities have saved business, online retailers and financial institutions potential fraud losses estimated at more than half a billion pounds, and at the same time protected thousands of individuals from the distress caused by being a victim of fraud or identity crime.” An alleged operator in Macedonia was one of those arrested, while two British men accused of buying the information were also detained. Britain’s Dedicated Cheque & Plastic Crime Unit also seized computers suspected of being used to commit fraud.

1.8 million complaints of fraud, identity theft or some other deceptive business practices last year. This is up roughly 40% from 2010. 24/7 Wall St. examined the 10 states that had the most complaints in proportion to the size of their populations.

When times are hard, fraud often gets worse. Americans are under great financial pressure, and there is no shortage of criminals waiting to take advantage of it. According to the most recent report published by the Federal Trade Commission, there were more than 1.8 million complaints of fraud, identity theft or some other deceptive business practices last year. This is up roughly 40% from 2010. 24/7 Wall St. examined the 10 states that had the most complaints in proportion to the size of their populations.

More than 30 different categories of complaints were recorded in 2011. Identity theft was the most common one, representing 15% of all complaints. Many other categories relate to a growing number of Americans in debt as a result of the recession and the housing crash. Debt collection fraud was the second most common category, defined by the FTC as consumers reporting abuse by both legitimate debt collectors and those pretending to be. Other categories included banking and lending scams, as well as scams arising from promises of relief from mortgage debt.

The FTC's Bureau of Consumer Protection has focused in the past five years on "last dollar frauds," such as mortgage foreclosure rescue scams. According to associate director of the Division of Planning and Labor David Torok, "These are the truly pernicious frauds that steal from the consumers that are facing economic problems." These frauds take advantage of consumers in need, "ripping them off under the guise of trying to help them."

Not surprisingly, many of the states that had the highest rates of fraud also experienced the worst of the recession. Five of the 10 worst-off states lost at least 25% of total home value from their prerecession peaks. Seven of the states on this list have among the highest percentage of homeowners who were delinquent on housing payments at the end of 2011.

According to John Simpson at Consumer Watchdog, "It makes sense that states with the highest levels of debt and biggest declines in home value would be the hardest hit by fraud." People is these states "were willing to try solutions that were obviously too good to be true."

While some of the states with the worst rates of fraud have residents that are struggling, many of these states also have relatively wealthy populations who carry a lot of household debt. Six of the 10 states with the highest rates of fraud have among the top 15 highest median incomes. Eight of the states are in the top 15 for mortgage debt per person, and five are in the top 10 for highest credit card debt, according to credit data analytics firm Credit Karma.

In order to identify the 10 states with the highest incidence of fraud, 24/7 Wall st. reviewed data from the FTC's Sentinel Network Data Book, which compiles the total number of complaints for each state. These complaints are divided between identity theft and a second category, which includes all other kinds of fraud. 24/7 Wall St. combined the total complaints of fraud per 100,000 people in each of these categories.

These are the 10 worst states for fraud.

America's Worst States for Fraud

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• 10. New Jersey

  Complaints per 100,000 population: 538
  Total complaints: 47,336
  Identity theft complaints per 100,000: 86.4 (8th most)
  Recession home value decline: 19.2% (17th largest)
  Homes late on payment or in foreclosure: 10.6% (3rd most)

  New Jersey had 47,336 fraud related complaints in 2011, or the equivalent of 538 per 100,000 people. The state had roughly 7,600 reports of identity theft last year and nearly 40,000 complaints categorized as fraud or other. Thirteen percent of fraud reports in the state fell into the "advance fee loans and credit protection/repair" category. New Jersey has, according to Credit Karma, the fourth highest credit carddebt per capita and mortgage debt per capita.

• 9. Washington

  Complaints per 100,000 population: 546
  Total complaints: 36,685
  Identity theft complaints per 100,000: 72.2 (18th most)
  Recession home value decline: 26.6% (8th largest)
  Homes late on payment or in foreclosure: 6.2% (22nd most)

  In 2011, Washington state residents reported 36,685 counts of fraud, or 546 for every 100,000 people. The Mount Vernon-Anacortes Metropolitan region was a particularly hard-hit area, reporting a rate of 833.4 cases per 100,000 residents. The most common type of complaint was debt collection fraud, followed by Internet services and prizes, sweepstakes and lotteries. While the state is among the worst in several categories, identity theft is not a serious problem. Washington only ranks 18th-worst in the country.

• 8. Georgia

  Complaints per 100,000 population: 568
  Total complaints: 55,020
  Identity theft complaints per 100,000: 120 (2nd most)
  Recession home value decline: 26% (10th largest)
  %19 > Total complaints: (6th most)

  Georgia only had the 13th-highest level of fraud and other than identity theft complaints. Meanwhile, identity theft complaints were 120 per every 100,000 residents, the second worst in the country. Creditcard fraud accounted for 17% of identity theft. Phone and utilities fraud accounted for 14% and bank fraud for 12%.

• 7. Virginia

  Complaints per 100,000 population: 595
  Total complaints: 47,581
  Identity theft complaints per 100,000: 67.7 (21st most)
  Recession home value decline: 16.7% (21st largest)
  Homes late on payment or in foreclosure: 4.1% (10th fewest)

  Virginia's reported incidents of identity theft relative to the size of the state's population were about average relative to the rest of the country. However, the state had the fifth-highest rate of fraud and other complaints, at 527 incidents per 100,000 people. After debt collection fraud reports, the most common complaints were shop-at-home catalog sales, followed by banks and lenders. The state has the ninth-highest credit card debt per capita in the country, the seventh-highest mortgage debt per capita and the 10th-worst average credit score.

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