So I read this article from CyberNews that talked about how criminals are really taking advantage of people, especially in the recent wildfires.
On this blog, we’ve talked about the criminals that have decided to come up with schemes that promise tons of money.
But now, its gone to the real world. The real world with communities that have been severely impacted by devistation of a combination of stupid fucks who started fires and a wind event that Mother Nature gave us.
Not every fire that was talked about that we know of was nature made. What I mean by that is that something in Nature or an accident like a car spark started the fires.
When we get the notes out for podcast 222 which has been available on our RSS feed since Wednesday, you’ll hear some of the stuff that some of these stupid fucks have done.
This article as I said was found on CyberScoop, so let’s dive in.
Cybercriminals are using various tactics to scam unsuspecting victims and good Samaritans out of their money and sensitive information during the devastation following the Los Angeles wildfires.
The cybersecurity company BforeAI discovered 119 domains registered between January 8th and January 13th, 2025, at the height of the wildfire panic and just as the wildfires were gaining significant media attention.
This is why I have written for a call to have every single domain owner tell their registrar of choice what they plan to do with the domain.
I have one domain which is mainly used for email communication and that’s a valid reason to have one.
All of my domains have a purpose, they do not sit there, and they are not intended for the shit that we see and talk about.
The cybersecurity company BforeAI discovered 119 domains registered between January 8th and January 13th, 2025, at the height of the wildfire panic and just as the wildfires were gaining significant media attention.
Why the fuck do you need 119 domains claiming you’re going to give relief to these poor folks who have practicly lost everything in some cases? This is fucking stupid!
These domains utilized keywords such as “LA fire,” “wildfire,” “relief,” “fund,” and “rebuild,” capitalizing on the topics trending in the media.
Of course it would! This is to give people the opportunity to find ways to donate and help these poor folk, and or the poor folk to find resources to help them. The problem, there are only a handful of companies that are dedicated for this. The Red Cross is one of them.
Half of the domains were registered through GoDaddy, a web hosting service recently slammed by the Federal Trade Commission for poor cybersecurity practices.
As we wrote under that article, they’re claiming they’ve done nothing wrong. But don’t worry, they don’t ask you about what you’re going to use the domain for, and a lot of the domains they buy are using TLDs that your common user will not know even exist.
For bonus points, tell me some of the TLD’s that might be used in this case.
Other web hosting services involved include Namecheap, Register, Ionos, Hostinger, Squarespace, Tucows, and more.
I’m familiar with several in this list, one is my registrar of choice, and another is the backbone of another company that you can buy domains from. None of the companies listed to my knowledge ever ask for any reason for you to buy the domain.
Registrars should continue to look at the domains to determine if they’re still revelent. This means that if my web site jaredrimer.net didn’t look like it did when I told them the site is up and operational, they would be allowed to take that domain away frpom me.
The problem is, that they used the TLD of .com which made up 70 percent of the bad domains. That paragraph said:
Scammers aimed to assert credibility by using top-level domains (TDL) like “.com,” which made up 70% of the total number of sites.
CyberNews uses TDL, but the correct term is TLD.
Curiously, the bad actors used the TDL “.fund,” which hinted at their main objective – to steal funds from unsuspecting victims and good Samaritans.
Go Fund Me
Go FUND Me is one of these sites that allow people like you and I to write up a page and try to raise money for things we need. One of the articles we’ll be covering as part of the show notes talks about how Go Fund Me was used.
A plethora of fake GoFundMe’s began popping up during the LA wildfires. However, they weren’t established to help rebuild homes or provide aid to families and individuals affected by the fires. Instead, scammers exploited lost and injured family pets to pilfer money from unsuspecting victims.
For example, one supposed criminal created a GoFundMe for a dog that was supposedly injured by the wildfires. The campaign was called “Aid Our Recovery from LA Fire Tragedy.”
The images that were put up may not have been the correct images, they could have been others. This is what is so fucked up about this whole ordeal. They want to make it believable, and this is where the web and disasters like this come together.
Some of the Go Fund Me pages pretended to be people or agencies that were going to supposedly help you, but they took your money and ran instead.
Other Unbelievable Scams
If that doesn’t make you angry, then you should see some of what they’re up to now in this section.
Setting up stores to sell things people need is one thing, but saying that the fire department provides these things is something else.
Crooks even set up merchandise stores claiming to support victims of the LA wildfires under the guise that this merchandise was coming from the Los Angeles Fire Department.
Has anyone heard of this before?
Don’t even get me started on the Crypto Currency stuff.
New cryptocurrency coins relating to the LA wildfires also began to surge, coins that may or may not be legitimate. However, victims could potentially fall prey to these “get rich quick” schemes.
What kind of crypto currency coins? I’d be curious on their names. We know there are tons of different coins. We know there are always crypto schemes and we always tell you to invest wisely.
These crypto “pump and dump” schemes also use social media to target far-reaching audiences, which is what makes these scams so successful, BforeAI concluded, especially at a time when keywords like “Los Angeles” and “wildfires” are trending.
Search out Pump and Dump scams to lern more, this goes back many many years.
One person who has participated on my programming indicated that people like this should be shot. While I agree, some of these guys and girls can actually work and can do good in society. The fact that they choose to do this shit instead is just not good, especially when you take advantage of others in disaster.
I know that some of this is done during the hurricane season, and those who do that should be ashamed of themselves. Go and find a job you are good at and quit this shit. When you’re caught, as some have, you’re not going to like the consequences.
Cybercriminals capitalize on LA wildfire chaos via fake GoFundMe’s and crypto coins is the article if you want to read this for yourself. Just fucking rediculous if you ask me.
Edited January 18th to correcct .colm to .com in a paragraph.
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