First, I need to make a few things clear. I use capital first letters to denote important facts, since this site claims using all caps makes it hard to read.
Second, I am an Identity Theft and Legal Services Consultant; working with the national expert on the subject, consultant to the FBI, CIA, and many other government and law enforcement agencies. We educate and protect families and businesses.
I have already done a small internet investigation on my own to track down National Asset Recovery Services, and was not surprised to find that they are Not headquartered in the Caribbean. I contacted the company, who verified that this was a scam and asked me for any information I could provide. This, like many such scams, is being conducted by a thief, and not half bad at that (I will explain why in a minute).
Here's the story:
A guy claiming to be Mark Riley called Claiming to be with National Asset Recovery Services, Supposedly headquartered in the Caribbean. He claimed I had won 2.5 million from International Sweepstakes Corporation, and that they had authorized his company to notify me in an attempt to give me a second chance to claim my winnings. He claimed that there would be a fee of $6,000 After I recieved the check and it had gone through, which would supposedly take 3-4 working days.
Now, knowing what I do about Identity Theft and many methods criminals are using to dupe people, I was very skeptical, although I vaguely remembered getting a letter from a company like that claiming I had won money (probably the same people making their first attempt). Whoever came up with this one was prety smart, but he hired the wrong people to cary it out who weren't so smart. The concept was believable, and if it was folowing up from another scam attempt, had thought up a good way to do it.
I started asking questions, pushing him to come up with answers he might not expect. I asked him about the company, and pushed for the catch. He finally admitted there was an up-front cost of $900. I told him I was prety sure I had heard it was illegal to charge money for winnings, but not to chase him off, I said that the $6,000 made sence just not the up-front charge.
He responded by trying to cut the fee in half. That made it fairly apparent the fee was the scam, so I pushed to get information I could use against him by telling him to send me information I could have my lawyer look over. If he was dumb enough to send it, I knew my law firm would be able to uncover the truth quickly.
He tried to ask me if he did, if I would have the money to pay him. I said I would deal with that once my lawyer had verified the information. Here's where he messed up.
He tried to tell me the fax machine was down. If this company was as international as he was claiming, and he was at the headquarters, there's absolutely no way in hell they would have less than five fax machines minimum. On top of that, he stuttered to come up with the response and then to say he should be able to scan it in and add it to an email. I haven't heard from him since, and have gotten no email.
I have to admit, most people might have fallen for this scam and not gotten that far. It was well planned. I've been phished like crazy over email and phone, but this one was probably the most believable yet. Most of the others were ill-concieved, not very elaborate, and run by people with middle-eastern accents.
I read through some of the other reports against National Asset Recovery. I'm not 100% sure if it's the same or not. The reports weren't that detailed, but either way, please be careful not to assume the people you are dealing with are from the company itself.
The best way to solve situations like this is to have access to attorneys and ID Theft protection services who can investigate such cases for you. As ID Theft consultants, we have found only One set of services truely protecting people from Identity Theft. I'm hoping to partner with consumer complaints to help protect people who come to this site
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