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A fraudster got $12M out of a Canadian university

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Re: A fraudster got $12M out of a Canadian university

#51

Post by HarryHirsch »

badrequest wrote: post #32
scott_s wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While I think everyone should be aware of phishing, I don't think any amount of education can reliably prevent this sort of fraud. I see this fundamentally as a process problem, as I assume email was a common way of changing payment information. Email needs to be taken out of the loop.

I wonder if GPG could have ensured this didn't happen.

When you use Microsoft Safelinks URL rewriter you preclude cryptographic signing. The Safelinks crap is just crap, it obfuscates URLs and you can't sign your messages any longer.

Re: A fraudster got $12M out of a Canadian university

#52

Post by tialaramex »

PaulHoule wrote: post #45

I get incomprehensible bills from the hospital whenever I get a test or see a physical therapist, etc. Sometimes I get bills about a service that happened 2 years ago, don't remember what the service was, and it seems they can't tell me because that would violate my privacy or something. I've always wondered if I sent an invoice to the hospital for unspecified services if they'd pay it.

Possibly.

I worked for university accounting many, many years ago. We paid late. Ninety day terms and then maybe we'd forget to pay your invoice for a whole month, oops.

And for little one man engineering outfits supplying the science department I was working in this was life-or-death stuff, because you know they've bought those materials on credit, they've done all the work, and then you haven't even the decency to pay on time. They'd phone up, so desperate for their money and I felt really bad for them saying I can't make it happen, some guy I've never met controls actually paying them.

But for a huge chain store, they don't put up with any of that nonsense. Our department as well as all this sophisticated hand-made one-off stuff had bought a dish washer for some project, ordinary dish washer from a famous high street store. The university didn't pay them on time. So they immediately sent a bill for the cost of sending an overdue letter, plus interest.

We paid that.

So that's the lesson to all those little engineering firms, if you have the balls to do it. Just send "Payment overdue" notices with a new additional invoice and that'll go in the same "Paid eventually but not on time" pile and it'll get paid. You won't get paid faster, but maybe the extra money helps take the sting off a bit.

Re: A fraudster got $12M out of a Canadian university

#53

Post by nerdponx »

They quickly discovered that while the email appeared to have been sent by “accounts.recievable@clarkbuilders.com” the email address had been “spoofed.” The display name of the email was different than the actual originating account.

Isn't this glaring security issue trivially fixable from the perspective of an email client developer?

Re: A fraudster got $12M out of a Canadian university

#54

Post by wongarsu »

minikites wrote: post #33
drewg123 wrote: post #27

MacEwan was in the midst of constructing the $180-million Allard Hall: a state-of-the-art building boasting music studios and dance halls with room for 1,800 students Why does a college need a building that costs a large fraction of a billion dollars? Early this week we had an article about college education costs being one corner of the "Bermuda triangle" of personal finance. Out of control spending on new, shiny th…

>Why does a college need a building that costs a large fraction of a billion dollars? It's the end result of applying capitalism to all human activities. Schools have to compete for students and they do so with activities that prospective students and parents will respond to. It's also why health care costs are higher when privatized, they're similar "markets".

>It's the end result of applying capitalism to all human activities.

I would argue both extremes work: free education works (see Europe), completely capitalistic education should also work. But America doesn't apply captitalism to education. Schools have all the pressure of competition you describe, but normally the lifetime profitability of gaining a degree as would put a reasonable ceiling on education costs (outside of elite institutions for the rich and gifted). But in the US, student loans with their subsidies and special legal status remove monetary restrictions from the market, allowing most people to pay whatever the schools ask for. And for the supply side of any capitalist market it is only rational to raise prices to what the market is willing and able to pay.

In a free, unsubsidized, unpriviledged market for student loans we wouldn't see massivley rising education costs. Social mobility might be even worse though, so free education is likely still superiour.

Re: A fraudster got $12M out of a Canadian university

#55

Post by timcederman »

ig1 wrote: post #15

I'd love to fund a startup fixing this problem. It's a clear space where technology has the edge over humans and there's huge network advantages (e.g. you see a new account # for a known entity, especially at a different bank it's a big red flag).

There is a startup in this space - Agari (www.agari.com)

Re: A fraudster got $12M out of a Canadian university

#56

Post by Retric »

warent wrote: post #47
Retric wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is the worlds 'state of the art'. You don't need a lot of space for dance halls and music studios for under 2000 students. People add sound insulation to existing rooms at relatively low cost and it's cheaper when your starting from scratch. So, in terms of education they really could have done the same thing for under 50 million, but why build a utilitarian box when you want to attract students.

I think they meant it's enough space for 1800 students simultaneously , which is actually quite a large number.

This is not a picture of efficient use of space: https://www.macewan.ca/contribute/groups/public/documents/im...

The school only has 20k student population and music students are going to other buildings. So, it's not simultaneously unless you mean as an audience.

I mean sure it looks nice, but that price tag is not due to utility. 60 million still pays for a huge building even at 1/3 the cost.

Re: A fraudster got $12M out of a Canadian university

#57

Post by athenot »

alaskamiller wrote: post #50
drewg123 wrote: post #27

MacEwan was in the midst of constructing the $180-million Allard Hall: a state-of-the-art building boasting music studios and dance halls with room for 1,800 students Why does a college need a building that costs a large fraction of a billion dollars? Early this week we had an article about college education costs being one corner of the "Bermuda triangle" of personal finance. Out of control spending on new, shiny th…

A building is meant to last for awhile. Say it's 20 years. $180MM / (20 yrs x 1800 people) = $5000/yr/person Is that unreasonable?

Per your sibbing comment, that's 100% of the price of their tuition at a Canadian university.

Re: A fraudster got $12M out of a Canadian university

#60

Post by grawprog »

walrus01 wrote: post #19
Scoundreller wrote: post #16

> Yangjiang City Jixie Zhulu Engineering made four payments to the Mas totalling ¥6.7 million, which would have been worth approximately $1.2 million. In August, Hoi Fu Enterprises received three wire transfers totalling $1 million. Interesting to see that a dollar in Canada is worth 16.7% more than the same dollar in China. And that was for a deal that was too good to be true. I wonder what the real going rate is fo…

China has really strict controls on the amount of money that a Chinese citizen can legally wire transfer out of the country, to a foreign domestic bank account, per year. People have come up with all sorts of "creative" grey and black market things involving Vancouver real estate and BC casinos. Google "china money laundering BC" for news about it.

Ya....a coworker of mine recently had to return to China to bring his retirement money back to canada. I'm not sure of the details of how he went about doing that. Does the limit apply to physically bringing currency back also? I'd ask my coworker but he doesn't speak English and I don't speak Cantonese.
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