NIXA, Mo. (KY3) — The Higher Enterprise Bureau is investigating the identification theft of a Nixa enterprise this week, tracing scammers all the best way to Germany.
“I put in our personal firm identify and one other web site got here up,” mentioned Debra Brewster, the founding father of Edge Capital Advisors, LLC.
Brewster mentioned an alert that somebody had signed in to her LinkedIn account led her down a rabbit gap of knowledge, revealing that her firm, Edge Capital Advisors Group, LLC had been impersonated utilizing a bogus web site.
“It had my company license data, it had clearly my LinkedIn account, they took over our complete entity,” she mentioned.
Her granddaughter, Kara Musso, instantly did some digging, mentioning issues that exposed the fraudulent web site, created in June 2019, was pretend.
“We began trying down of their social media hyperlinks, we reverse picture searched the pictures,” Musso mentioned. “It was only a loopy rabbit gap we went down.”
Brewster, who’s firm was first began in Arizona, mentioned her firm is not the one sufferer right here.
“In addition to utilizing our company identification, they really took one other firm from New Jersey, they took their workers and had all of their workers on the web site, however with out company entity,” she mentioned.
Brewster mentioned the opposite firm had been investigating the false web site themselves since December, however she was by no means notified. Brewster mentioned she did not discover out concerning the fraud till final Friday.
“We contacted the FBI in Arizona in addition to New Jersey, their cyber crime division, the secretary of state in each the states, the division of companies, the regulatory physique, as well as,” she mentioned.
The corporate additionally reached out to the Higher Enterprise Bureau and inside 24 hours that they had an alert posted on their web site warning of the pretend web site.
“They have been very aggressive and I am unable to communicate sufficient about that,” Brewster mentioned. “They jumped in and took an important position with no cash being requested to do this.”
She mentioned her firm has not accepted any on-line purposes up to now, so none of her shoppers’ delicate data is in danger. However, Brewster mentioned they do not know how many individuals may have been scammed by the fraudulent web site up to now.
Now, she needs to ship a warning for anybody making use of for a mortgage on-line.
“You do not know if they’re working by a voice over IP in some international nation and the web site is definitely stating the identify of the corporate that you just do enterprise with,” Brewster mentioned.
Shes mentioned she has not heard again from the Worldwide Crime Criticism Middle but, however is hopeful the fraudulent web site will probably be shut down.
Her firm didn’t face any monetary loss throughout this time.
Brewster mentioned she, her husband and Musso have spent hours of their dwelling workplace combing by the web site to search out extra solutions. She believes she has been in a position to pinpoint who might have accomplished this, however argued they might not be in Germany.
