A Russian trader used stolen brokerage credentials from E-Trade, Ameritrade, and Scottrade to run pump-and-dump schemes through shell companies in Estonia and Belize. The SEC case reveals how hackers steal usernames and passwords to exploit online trading platforms and manipulate stock prices.
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Pump and dump and steal your cash. You may be smart enough to avoid the boiler room, but is your online account safe from this new world of stock scams? We'll take you inside the latest way crooks are trying to separate you from your profits. Call it a one-man pump and dump machine. A Russian doing business in Estonia through a bank from Belize, accused of investing in thinly traded stocks, then stealing passwords from E-Trade and other online brokerages, running up the price of certain equities, then dumping out. And cashing in. Mike Hachman is following the money from Russia to Estonia to Belize and into your bank account.
It's an old-fashioned scam with a modern twist. The SEC charging a Russian trader with using stolen online brokerage account data to place trades with stolen money to pump and dump, drive up the price, and then cash out. Among the companies with accounts believed to have been hacked E-Trade, Ameritrade, and Scottrade. Internet security experts say the increasing popularity of online trading sites make them a growing target.
Organized criminals have realized that the way in which consumers trade online is an insecure system, meaning that the simple username and password can easily be compromised, and then the web mob, the online criminals, have complete access to their entire life investments.
The SEC The FCC says cyberattacks of online data are a growing concern.
