Steve Fulmer Addresses Computer Crime
Posted by Jared Jester
Some of today’s most dangerous criminals are likely to attack not with a gun or a knife, but with a telephone or a computer, one of South Carolina’s top investigators of financial and securities fraud told Bluffton Rotarians this week.
“Every time you turn on your computer, every time you open your mail, every time you answer your phone, you’re vulnerable,” said Steve Fulmer of the South Carolina Attorney General’s Securities Division. “There are some pretty bizarre things going on out there.”
Fulmer investigates Ponzi schemes, worthless stock cases, bogus foreign currency exchange trading programs and other investment matters. HE said that three Ponzi schemes have been discovered in the Easley area in the past 18 months alone that cost investors millions of dollars.
A Ponzi scheme is a fraudulent investment operation that pays its investors out of money gathered from previous investors, or even from their own money. Scammers offer higher returns than typical mainstream investments, but that requires a growing stream of new investors who are needed to keep the scam afloat. Eventually, however, the scam collapses.
The fastest-growing problem today is identity theft, Fulmer said, which can affect everything from bank accounts to stock market portfolios. Safeguarding your personal financial information and passwords is vital, he said, adding that no one should ever discuss personal information on the telephone.
Two “popular” scams these days involve:
· Someone contacting you with news that you have won a multimillion-dollar sweepstakes prize provided that you make a $4,000 payment and deliver key information on your identity.
· Someone contacting you with news that a relative or friend is in jail in a foreign country or distant location, but they can be released with an electronic cash payment.
“The pattern in these scams is that everything is urgent, everything has to be done in a hurry,” Fulmer said. “They’re designed to push you along and not give you time to think.”
Other current scams include:
· “Pump-and-dump” penny stocks where bogus press releases are used to inflate the value of worthless stock, which the criminals can then unload on unsuspecting investors and make a profit.
· Bogus real estate investments, such as offers to buy shares of a company building condos in Mexico or developing an American-style bar in Hong Kong.
· Oil and gas schemes that require investments in oil wells in far-off locations that can’t be easily visited. While offering a share of profits, Fulmer said, such schemes often demand up-front payments for permits and production costs.
· So-called “affinity scams” that target members of identifiable groups such as the elderly, religious communities or ethnic groups.
“In all of these cases, the key to protecting yourself is the same,” Fulmer said. “You have to investigate before you invest. Make use of registered analysts or do your own research on the Internet. Sometimes it can be as simple as going to Google and typing in a name, plus the product being sold, plus ‘scam.’ ”
Fulmer said that it’s not enough to safeguard yourself. It’s also important to watch out for your relatives, children, senior citizens or others who might be vulnerable to financial predators.
“The old saying is still worth remembering,” he said. “If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.”
Fulmer was born and raised in South Carolina, graduated from Wofford College and was commissioned in the U.S. Army Signal Corps. After leaving the Army, he worked as a stock broker until going back to school to earn a Master’s Degree in Criminal Justice from the University of South Carolina and working for NCIS in Washington and specializing in Navy procurement fraud cases. After 10 years in that job, he joined the Criminal Investigation Division of the Department of Veterans Affairs as the head investigator in North and South Carolina.
Fulmer retired from federal service in 2007 and was hired to his current position as an investigator in the Securities Division of the South Carolina Attorney General’s Office.