State Champ Radio

by DJ Frosty

Current track

Title

Artist

Current show
blank

State Champ Radio Mix

1:00 pm 7:00 pm

Current show
blank

State Champ Radio Mix

1:00 pm 7:00 pm


fraud

Page: 2

HipHopWired Featured Video

Sean Kingston and his mother, Janice Louis, are currently facing charges of committing over $1 million in fraud after the Jamaican-American artist’s home was raided. Sean Kingston has since agreed not to fight extradition to Florida after he was arrested last week at a California Army base.
Authorities in Florida recently raided the rented Fort Lauderdale home of Sean Kingston, 34, and arrested Kingston’s mother, Janice Louis, 61, without incident as reported by outlets TMZ and The Associated Press.

According to the AP, Kingston waived the right to fight extradition on Tuesday (May 28) while in court in California and will subsequently be handed over to Florida law enforcement officials. Both Kingston and Louis were charged in the alleged fraud scheme. The report adds that while Kingston did not appear in a San Bernardino court, he was still jailed as of Tuesday afternoon, and it was confirmed that officials from the Broward County Sheriff’s Office will handle his transfer to Florida to face charges.
Last week, Kingston was performing at Fort Irwin, an Army training base in the Mojave Desert. During his arrest, Louis was taken away in handcuffs in Florida after a SWAT team raided Kingston’s Florida mansion.
The charges faced by Kingston and Louis are conducting an organized scheme to defraud, grand theft, identity theft, and related crimes. Among the items that were said to be stolen included a Cadillac Escalade, furniture, jewelry, and money.
Sean Kingston recently took to Instagram to state that he and his mother are in good spirits and that his attorneys are handling the matter.
It isn’t known when the extradition will occur but we will update this story as it happens.

Photo: Getty

HipHopWired Featured Video

CLOSE

Source: Johnny Nunez / Getty / Bishop Lamor Whitehead
They say God don’t like ugly, and it looks like Bishop Lamor Whitehead will have to pay for his sins.
Bishop Lamor Whitehead, aka the “Bling Bishop,” is looking at some serious jail time after he was found guilty of wire fraud, attempted extortion, and lying to the FBI in Manhattan Federal Court.
Per Gothamist:
After just a few hours of deliberation, the jury convicted “Bling Bishop” Lamor Whitehead, 46, of five counts, agreeing that he had used his position of power and influence to swindle hundreds of thousands of dollars from people who trusted him.
Whitehead could face up to 45 years in prison.
A Breakdown of Bishop Lamor Whitehead’s Scammy Ways
Prosecutors convinced a jury that Whitehead deceived one of the members of his flock’s mother to give him $90,000 out of her retirement savings, promising to buy her a house and remodel it so she could move in, the website reports.
According to court documents, the Canal Street shopping pastor never bought the house and used the money to fund his lavish lifestyle.
Prosecutors also made the case that Whitehead swindled a Bronx businessman into giving him $5,000 and then an additional $500,000, claiming he could get him favors from Mayor Mixxy, aka Mayor Eric Adams.
The current New York Mayor does not deny dealing with Whitehead, but there is no proof that he had anything to do with any of the Bling Bishop’s scams.
Besides, Adam has his own issues to worry about, with several of his aides having their homes raided by the Feds.
Court documents also say Whitehead lied to lenders about his net worth to secure a personal loan and lied to the FBI, claiming he had only one phone when, according to prosecutors, he had two.
Following the verdict, Whitehead’s attorney, Dawn Florio, had nothing to say when pressed for comment.
Of course, Whitehead did, taking to Instagram to drop a video from his luxury vehicle, writing in the caption for the post, “This Wasn’t About Me…. I was not going to be an informant for the FBI against NYC Mayor Eric Adams.
We Will Be Appealing This Verdit”

We will continue to monitor this situation.
You can see reactions to the news in the gallery below.

1. Sheesh.

3. Even Ray Charles could see this man’s scamming ways.

5. God is Always on time.

HipHopWired Featured Video

Source: Johnny Nunez / Getty / Bishop Lamor Whitehead
Canal Street shopper and real-like scamming villain Bishop Lamor Whitehead’s fraud trial has begun, and the allegations coming out are very eyebrow-raising.
The “Bling Bishop,” who became a household name after thieves relieved him of his jewelry during a live stream of his church service, could be in serious trouble if these accusations about him are true.

The New York Daily News reports that Whitehead allegedly abused the trust of members of his flock and lied about getting “the key to the city” from Mayor Mixxy, aka Eric Adams, to make his pockets fatter and fill his closet with more than likely fugazi designer clothing like Loius Vuitton according to federal prosecutors.
A Breakdown of The N*ggler’s Fraudulent Activity Per The New York Daily News:
“During this trial, you’ll learn that the defendant was trusted by many in his community. He was the bishop of a small church in Brooklyn and a self-described businessman. He was a friend to the mayor of New York City,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Jessica Greenwood said in Manhattan Federal Court.
“The defendant abused that trust by lying again and again. He lied about how much money he had. He lied about his business plans. And he lied about having influence with powerful people. All with the goal of getting money and property to fund his extravagant lifestyle.”
“The defendant convinced this woman, who had spent her career working as a nurse, to give him $90,000 of her life savings,” Greenwood said. “He promised to use the money to buy a fixer-upper home that he would renovate for her to live in. And she believed the defendant — a man, who by that time, had become a mentor and spiritual adviser to her son.”
Greenwood alleged Whitehead instead spent the cash on himself, including splurging on designer clothing and a BMW payment.
“The victim never got her house, and she never got her money back.”
Other Charges
In other related charges to the December 2022 case, Whitehead allegedly drew up fake bank statements to secure a $250,000 loan, claiming he had millions in a bank account that only had $6.
In another charge, he threatened the owner of a Bronx body shop, Brandon Belmonte, and allegedly tried to extort him for $5,000 following a repair job.
Whitehead also tried to get Belmonte to put his name on a $500,000 real estate deal, claiming he could get favors from Mayor Adams to make them millions.
The 47-year-old “religious figure” is being accused of wire fraud, extortion, and related offenses and is looking at a decades-long prison sentence.
He has pleaded not guilty to all charges. His attorney, Dawn Florio, asked the jurors to reserve judgment until they saw all the evidence and blamed the parishioner’s misfortunes on her son.

If this is all true, this guy sounds like the ultimate scumbag.
Remember, God doesn’t like ugly.

HipHopWired Featured Video

Source: The Washington Post / Getty
Former Baltimore County state attorney Marilyn Mosby was found guilty of perjury, leaving her to face a possible ten-year jail sentence.
On Thursday (November 9), a federal jury returned a guilty verdict against Marilyn Mosby on two counts of perjury for falsely claiming to experience hardship to withdraw money from her retirement fund. Each count brings with it a potential sentence of up to five years imprisonment. 

The initial indictment brought against Mosby in January of this year detailed that the 43-year-old had claimed that the hardship was due to the COVID-19 pandemic, citing the CARES Act which allowed people to make such a move. But it was later discovered through payroll documents that in her role as state attorney for Baltimore County, Mosby still earned a considerable salary of $250,000 with no reduction in her weekly work hours. Federal prosecutors stated that she used the money on down payments for vacation homes in Florida.
“Telling the truth especially matters when public officials are looking to access funds for their own personal use,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Aaron Zelinsky attorney said during the closing statements of the three-day trial. “We should not allow her to lie and commit perjury to purchase Florida vacation homes in the worst pandemic in 100 years.”
The verdict is the latest blow to Marilyn Mosby, who had attained national prominence due to the turmoil surrounding the death of Freddie Gray, a Black man arrested for possession of a pen knife in 2015 who died under suspicious circumstances while under police custody. Mosby stood by the medical examiner’s report stating that Gray’s death was a homicide, calling for the six cops involved to be indicted. Three of the officers were found not guilty leading Mosby to drop charges against the remaining officers.
A separate case where Mosby faces two counts of federal mortgage fraud is on the horizon for the former attorney, whose loss in this case means that she will lose her license to practice law. The belief is that federal attorneys have a stronger case with those charges. “Now what’s interesting is to see if the government decides to prosecute her on the second [charges] or if they work out some kind of plea agreement,” defense attorney Albert I. Alperstein said to The Baltimore Sun. 

HipHopWired Featured Video

Sam Bankman-Fried, the founder of the FTX cryptocurrency exchange, was found guilty of the seven charges levied against him in the explosive fraud case. According to reports, Bankman-Fried could face over 100 years in prison if federal sentencing guidelines are followed and there is still another trial to come next year.
For five weeks, Sam Bankman-Fried, 31, stood trial at the Daniel Patrick Moynihan U.S. Courthouse in Manhattan, N.Y. and this past Thursday (November 2), the co-founder of FTX and Alameda Research heard the guilty verdict on fraud, conspiracy, and money laundering charges.

As reported by The Washington Post, Bankman-Fried was found guilty of two counts of wire fraud, four counts of conspiracy to commit fraud, and one count to commit money laundering. If all sentencing guidelines are followed, Bankman-Fried faces several decades in prison. Sentencing will take place on March 28.
“We respect the jury’s decision. But we are very disappointed with the result,” defense attorney Mark Cohen shared in a statement. “Mr. Bankman Fried maintains his innocence and will continue to vigorously fight the charges against him.”
According to prosecutors in the matter, Bankman-Fried allegedly swindled almost $10 billion from the victims of the fraud scheme as FTX was reportedly using customer contributions to fund Bankman-Fried’s lifestyle and purchases.
“The cryptocurrency industry might be new; players like Sam Bankman-Fried might be new. But this kind of fraud, this kind of corruption, is as old as time, and we have no patience for it,” U.S. Attorney Damian Williams said of the case.
Bankman-Friend is the son of Stanford University professors Joseph Bankman and Barbara Fried, both of whom attended the trial. Fried’s mother was said to be wrought with emotion after hearing the verdict against her son.
According to those who closely followed the case, the paper trail and testimony from former romantic partner and the former CEO of hedge fund Alameda Research, Caroline Ellison, along with accounts from former FTX executives, helped sink Bankman-Fried’s defense. But it appears that it was Bankman-Fried himself who didn’t fare well during intense cross-examination sessions.
Sam Bankman-Fried is due in court again on

Photo: Michael M. Santiago / Getty

HipHopWired Featured Video

Source: Robin L Marshall / Getty / Brittish Williams
Basketball Wives star Brittish Williams is learning the hard way that if you do the crime, you will have to do time.
Spotted on the Riverfront Times, Williams will have to do time and was sentenced to four years in prison after pleading guilty earlier this year to 15 counts of “various types of fraud.”

According to the RFT, Williams’ crimes she was accused of included not paying taxes and under-reporting the income of her businesses.
Williams also allegedly used other people’s identities to open bank accounts without their knowledge.
Williams, who starred in Basketball Wives and Marriage Boot Camp: Reality Stars and former co-host of the St. Louis radio station Hot 104.1, asked a judge for leniency during her sentencing, but Judge Henry Autrey was like nah.
Per Riverfront Times:
In court today, Williams and her attorney Beau Brindley asked Judge Henry Autrey for leniency in sentencing.
“I knew better, and I did wrong anyway,” Williams said, adding that the idea of being separated from her daughter was “heartbreaking.”
Judge Autrey seemed largely unswayed, telling Williams that he believed she possessed a “fraudster mentality.” He pointed out that in total, WIlliams’ various frauds led to her taking in $150,000 a year from 2017 to 2020.
“That’s a pretty damn good wage,” he said.
Autrey also suggested that Williams’ fame impacted his sentencing decision, saying, “Not only are you out there for people to watch your entertainment, but also for people to watch you. … That’s a big obligation.”
The website reports Williams dodged a bullet because it was recommended she do 63 years in prison. Still, her punishment was significantly more than the 18 months in jail or probation suggested by her attorney.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Diane Klocke pointed out that Williams was still committing fraud well after she was indicted and counseling people, telling them they don’t have to pay taxes the first few years of running a business.
After her indictment, she was still collecting pandemic-related rent relief under false pretenses and submitting bogus medical bills to an insurance company.
Williams also traveled without permission while still on pretrial monitoring, according to Klocke, who also notes that her wearing of an ankle monitor was subplot during a season of Basketball Wives. 
Following her sentencing, one of her friends lunged at a reporter as they filmed her leaving court.

Welp.

Photo: Robin L Marshall / Gett

HipHopWired Featured Video

DJ Envy found himself in the crosshairs of an ongoing investigation involving Cesar Pina and the FlippingNJ real estate business the pair often promoted via their respective channels. After the arrest of Cesar Pina last week, DJ Envy, through his representation, says he’ll cooperate with the authorities in supporting the investigation with information.
On Tuesday (October 24), Law & Crime reporter Meghann Cuniff, known for her coverage of the Megan Thee Stallion and Tory Lanez matter, took to X, formerly known as Twitter, to share a statement from Envy’s attorney, Massimo D’Angelo. D’Angelo says that his client will be a willing partner with federal investigators as they continue to work the case.

From X:

I just got off the phone with DJ Envy’s lawyer, Massimo D’Angelo, who says Envy is one of Cesar Pina’s Ponzi scheme victims.
“Obviously, Envy is going to be assisting and cooperating fully” to get not only his money back, but money back for the other victims.
In the thread, Cuniff added, “D’Angelo says Envy invested $500K with Pina but “didn’t get any money back. He paid out substantial sums similar to some of the other investors who thought they were getting money back.”
Cuniff concluded the thread by writing, “D’Angelo wouldn’t tell me if Envy has testified before a grand jury, but he’s agreed to go on a YouTube live with me later this week. It’s going to be great! I’ll announce the day and time ASAP.”
Fans of Cuniff have been calling for her expert breakdowns of the DJ Envy and Cesar Pina case, and their requests have apparently been answered. Check out the X thread below.


Photo: Getty

HipHopWired Featured Video

Source: Johnny Nunez / Getty / Cesar Pina
Morrrrrrnnninnngg everybody, or good afternoon, D J Envy’s real estate business partner, Cesar Pina, found himself in a pair of handcuffs due to fraud charges.

Spotted on HipHopDX via an RLS Media report, the New Jersey real estate property investor was arrested on charges concerning a wire fraud scheme.

According to the report, the 45-year-old was released on a $1 million secured bond and must wear an ankle monitoring device so they can keep tabs on him.
Per HipHopDX, Pina is accused of using his social media reach to hoodwink and bamboozle his followers by promising high investment returns.
Several people are accusing Pina of tricking them out of millions of dollars.
DJ Envy Could Be In Big Trouble
So, how is DJ Envy involved? The popular morning radio host could be in some deep trouble because he and Pina used to hold seminars across the country, and he could be a part of the scheme to defraud investors.
Against his legal team and co-host Charlamagne Tha God’s advice, Envy used his morning show to address the allegations against him.
Per HipHopDX:
“Let me explain some things,” he began. “So Cesar and myself did seminars. Now, the reason I did these seminars is because I wanted to uplift my community. I wanted to teach my community about real estate. Things that I didn’t know when I was buying my first home.
“So I did these seminars and brought industry professionals to all these seminars, whether it was real estate agents from different markets, contractors, money lenders. I even brought Auction.com to actually show people how to purchase houses online.”
He continued: “Now Cesar, if he took money, I wasn’t privy to it nor did I even know. But I do understand how people feel if they did give him money because I gave him a lot of money that I didn’t see a dollar of return.
“For anybody to say I was involved, that’s totally not true. I would never. I’ve been on radio close to 30 years, and never in my 30 years’ time did I do nothing but try to uplift people… And I would never take a dollar from somebody.”
Envy double-downed on his innocence in the matter, claiming “it’s not true at all” that he was privy to what was Pina was doing, adding that his former business partner wrote an affidavit saying, “DJ Envy, RaaShaun Casey had no knowledge of me investing people’s money.”

We shall see how this continues to play out.

Photo: Johnny Nunez / Getty

On July 19, Songtrust sent an email — part update, part apology — to the 350,000 songwriters who use the publishing administration company to collect their songwriting royalties. Songtrust’s message pointed to friction in this process: “slower registration timelines” for songs, which in turn would slow the flow of income, plus a “slower response rate” for writers who believed they were missing money or had other questions. 

The slow-down had a few causes, wrote Downtown Music Publishing president Emily Stephenson, including “new leadership,” a new “organizational structure,” and the implementation of Know Your Customer-style registration and payment processes to combat “increased fraud in the music industry.” (Downtown Music Holdings owns Songtrust.) “We recognize that these changes have caused frustration,” she added.

Four former Songtrust employees believe these delays have their roots in plans the company put into motion before this year. The ex-employees describe Songtrust as a “pioneering” organization that did something no company managed to do before: Offer professional-level publishing administration services to small, independent songwriters. “Before Songtrust,” Stephenson tells Billboard, “there was really no way for them to collect mechanical royalties.” 

The global publishing system was developed over decades to serve the needs of several thousand writers, not several hundred thousand. “The problem with music publishing,” according to one former employee, “is that scaling is nearly impossible because it’s kind of like an archaic, dark art.”

So as music creation exploded and Songtrust was “trying to sign so many people” starting at the end of 2019 and into 2020, a second former employee explains, “the technology couldn’t keep up with the volume.” 

At times, former employees say, that volume — of both new songwriters and new compositions — simply grew faster than the company could handle. (Songtrust is almost certainly not the only organization that has had trouble keeping up with the surge in music creation.) “Making the promise to help the little guys and then not following through on the best technology and best employees and resources — that’s where they f—ed up,” adds a third former employee. “That’s just not a feasible business model.” (Half a dozen former employees spoke in total, all on the condition of anonymity for fear of alienating former colleagues.)

Downtown Music executives disagree. “As the music industry grew, Songtrust grew, and we’re evolving to better serve independent songwriters,” Stephenson says. In a post-interview email, Songtrust executives added that despite “temporary delays in responding to writer inquiries,” the company “has continued to process and pay out royalties accurately and on time to all clients who have submitted accurate tax and payment information.” Multiple songwriters who spoke to Billboard about payment difficulties would take issue with that statement.  

“All Songwriters Deserve Publishing Administration”

Traditional music publishing companies focus on just a slice of the world’s songwriters — the top earners. One publishing administration executive says it’s not even worth it for his organization to work with “the bottom 80%” of clients because the cost of doing so would exceed the revenue collected. 

Songtrust launched in 2011 with the belief, as Stephenson puts it, “that all songwriters deserve a publishing administration solution.” The company has paid out more than $130 million in royalties so far, according to Downtown Music Holdings president Pieter van Rijn, and 2023 payouts are on pace for “another record year.”

To collect publishing royalties, most songwriters either sign with a publisher or a publishing administrator. Otherwise, it’s possible to register songs with both a performance rights organization (PRO) and a mechanical rights organization, but Songtrust facilitates what would otherwise be a complex, time-consuming process for a one-time fee of $100 per writer, plus 15% of the royalties it collects. 

In many cases, that may not amount to much; although some independent songwriters earn enough publishing income to live on, many earn next to nothing. And while there may be less money in this part of the market, the administrative work can be just as complicated, if not moreso. “It is a laborious task to onboard and disseminate music publishing information, particularly with DIY artists who are disadvantaged because they don’t have the knowledge base to understand the questions you’re even asking,” says Jeff Price, founder of another publishing administration company, Word Collections.

So it’s not surprising that former Songtrust employees say writers often make mistakes when registering their songs — claiming 100% ownership of a co-write, for example. Also, since it was relatively easy to sign up for Songtrust’s services, “if someone wants to register fraudulent things, they have the tools,” explains one former employee.

Fraud is a concern across the publishing sector. “If you do not register your songs with a PRO, someone else will within a few months, almost guaranteed,” according to one label founder who also oversees a publishing operation for the acts he signs. “Artists don’t know what publishing is to begin with, and there’s a lot of confusion and disinformation, [creating] a perfect recipe for fraud. This problem is only getting worse, especially for international artists finding success for the first time in the global marketplace.”

In the case of Songtrust, a former employee says that fraud on the platform — such as users registering songs they didn’t write — “creates distrust” with some of the societies charged with collecting royalties around the world. “That was happening to a big extent,” the former employee continues. 

There were also times, former Songtrusters say, that the societies simply didn’t have the technology to keep up with the number of songwriters it was representing — and that some of the societies focused their resources on the big writers and publishers who generate more revenue. “At scale, issues of bandwidth and efficiency are always a challenge when you have software-based rights administration,” a veteran rights administration executive says. 

Songtrust is in “daily communication with our partners at the collecting societies,” Stephenson says. “We maintain a very positive relationship with them and we’re constantly looking with them to improve the way we can support songwriters.”

In a post-interview email, Songtrust executives added that “the fact that [publishing administration] is a complex business does not change our belief that it is a worthwhile, meaningful service” for the long tail of songwriters. 

“There Are Always Issues”

At the end of 2019 and the start of 2020, former employees say Songtrust amped up its efforts to sign more songwriters, which taxed the company’s internal systems. (Around the same time, Downtown Music also went on a buying spree, acquiring the distributor CD Baby in March 2019 and the tech and services company Fuga in January 2020.) 

One former employee says that the company “really put their money into marketing.” The mindset, according to this person, was “let’s make us as shiny and inviting as possible on the front end, but we’re not going to fix any of the backend technology.” 

In another former employee’s view, Songtrust was “not prioritizing actually doing the job that we’re supposed to be doing” — registering and paying songwriters. A third former employee says simply, “if you invite too many people to your house, it’s gonna fall apart.”

Stephenson rejects the idea that the company was too focused on growth. Downtown Music executives also pushed back on former employees’ accounts of technical troubles. “Technology was not the issue” for Songtrust, van Rijn contends. “Based on the input of societies, we did improve our KYC [know your customer] and registration and data processes,” he notes. “Part of that is technical. Part of that is operations.” Van Rijn also points out that the $130 million Songtrust has paid out to date is money that “otherwise may not have found its way to the songwriter community.” 

The fact that small, independent songwriters have the means to collect royalties is fairly new; the publishing business wasn’t built for a world in which anyone can write a song on an app, upload it right away, and immediately start earning money around the world. Some amount of friction is inevitable when so many songwriters need to be integrated into the intricate, infamously opaque global music publishing system.

“When you have outcomes that you don’t like as a customer, or even as a partner, it’s easy to talk about incompetence,” says the veteran rights administration executive. “The reality is that these are the outcomes based on the way rights administration happens in the world.”

Some of the challenges faced by Songtrust are “endemic” in publishing, says Price, the Word Collections founder. The administration executive agrees: “Whether you’re a big company or a small one, there are always issues. It’s just that you’re going to get way more issues the bigger you are.”

Tickets for Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour are being protected by some of the most advanced ticketing technology ever created, but it’s done little to stop some Swifties from falling victim to fraud.
With what’s likely to be the year’s most in-demand tour has come a wave of online scams that mix high-tech identity theft with low-tech social engineering to target frustrated fans unable to buy tickets during the initial sale in November. Now ticket prices are going for up to 10-times face value on secondary sites and many fans are desperately looking for more affordable options. That’s also leaving them vulnerable to too-good-to-be-true swindlers selling fake tickets. In many cases, the fans don’t even realize they were ripped off until they get to the show.

Nationwide, consumer fraud was up 30% in 2022 over 2021, according to the Federal Trade Commission, costing consumers $8.8 billion. Fake ticket scams fall under what the FTC labels as “imposter scams,” second in total cost only to investor scams according to the FTC, which notes that individuals aged 30-39 are the most likely to be defrauded in 2023 with social media sites listed as the most common place where fraud occurs. The targeting of Taylor Swift fans and offering cheap tickets the seller doesn’t have (and then disappearing on the buyer after they send over the money) is in part due to enormous publicity around the tour and the huge demand for tickets and low supply.

“Con artists will seize any opportunity to rip people off and as soon as the tours for Taylor Swift or artists Beyoncé or The Cure were even announced, scammers trying to figure out ways to capitalize on people’s desperation to get tickets,” says Teresa Murray, a consumer watchdog with the Denver-based Public Interest Research Group. Murray says her group saw an uptick in forged barcodes, fake websites and spoofs on legitimate sights like StubHub and Ticketmaster popping up hoping to profit off the frenzy around the Eras tour.

Fans who have fallen victim to Taylor Swift ticket fraud often say they are lured into the scam through a post on Facebook, listed on regional group pages from seemingly legitimate accounts offering to sell tickets for an upcoming Swift show below the current asking price on secondary ticket markets.

“When you have people who are desperate [to buy tickets] and vulnerable to fraud, they tend to suspend their common sense and make decisions they wouldn’t normally make,” says Murray, adding that this type of fraud is perpetrated by both “people living in their mom’s basement” and sophisticated criminal groups operating in an organized manner.

What victims do not realize is that instead of talking to person living in their city, they are often talking to a hacker who has recently taken over someone’s Facebook account to appear like a real person with ties in the community. After some back and forth, the scammer convinces the victim to send them money though a cash app like Venmo or Zelle in exchange for tickets that either never arrive or are obvious fakes.

This increase in fraud is happening against a backdrop of transformative technology at Ticketmaster, deployed at a large scale for the Eras tour with the potential to drastically reduce and even eliminate most instances of ticket fraud. Whereas it used to be fraudsters could buy a print-at-home ticket and then sell multiple copies of that, Ticketmaster is now employing its Safetix technology for Swift’s tour and others to issue digital tickets that live exclusively within the Ticketmaster app and are impossible to duplicate in this way. Safetix creates an entire digital ecosystem around the life of the ticket, from its original purchase, through resale and up until the ticket is redeemed on the night of the show. The scam Swift fans describe operates completely outside of that ecosystem, without any protections for consumers.

For scammers, demanding payment upfront is a low-tech way to defeat an otherwise sophisticated security system. The only way to curb this type of fraud, Murray says, is to educate fans on how digital tickets work. Much of Ticketmaster’s consumer education efforts have focused on Swift fans who successfully bought tickets and need to know how to load tickets into their accounts, transfer them to friends and redeem the tickets on show night. While this effort to educate fans is important, it does little to inform fans who were unable to buy during the public sale so that they are better equipped to avoid being sold fake tickets when they attempt to buy secondary tickets

Murray recommends only purchasing resale tickets from official sellers with a clearly visible fan guarantee listed on their site, to only use credit cards (not debit cards) and to match up the seats being sold with a seat map of the venue to verify the seats and rows actually exist.

“Often times the con artists don’t bother to check if the seating section, row and seat numbers they claim to hold tickets for actually exist on a seat map,” Murray says. “A little research on your own might help you determine if the tickets being offered actually exist.”