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Archiver > NEW-ENGLAND-ISLANDS > 2004-01 > 1073585433


From: cmoltan <> (by way of David Sylvester <>)
Subject: Please be aware of this new, but old genealogy scam(s)!
Date: Thu, 08 Jan 2004 13:10:33 -0500


Everyone - please read.

I am forwarding this from fellow genealogist who just sent this
to me
today. She received this on another list and sent it to me. Some
of you
may be aware of this scam. I was not. Money is too hard to come
by as it
is, without losing like this. It's rather lengthy, but may save
someone
some trouble.

Cecilia

The below message is taken from an article in Dick Eastman's
newsletter.
Please send this on to others, we don't need anymore genealogists
getting
ripped off :)

One of the top stories in 2003 in this newsletter was the arrest of
Elias
Abodeely, a 23-year-old in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, who ran a string of
pseudo
genealogy sites. His arrest didn't seem to deter him: 2004 has
started off
with a rash of the same advertising.
For those who missed it, let's briefly recap this scam. The sites
involved
included GenSeeker.com, GenSeekers.com, genealogydevelopments.com,
familydiscovery.com, genealogyfinders.net, genlocator.com,
genealogy-express.com, and probably many others. Abodeely would
send out
spam mail from one site, then collect money until the complaints
mounted,
and his site eventually would be shut down by the hosting service.
A week or
two later he would appear with a new name and a new site on a different
hosting service conducting essentially the same business. To access his
sites, the hapless buyer paid $40 to $60 (the exact amount varied
from time
to time). None of these sites contained any genealogy information; they
simply had pointers to free sites where information could be found.
In other
words, the buyer paid $40 to $60 to access something that was already
available free of charge.

Abodeely eventually ran into lots of legal difficulties. On August
1, 2003,
he was arrested in Cedar Rapids, Iowa on felony charges of first-degree
theft, money laundering, and ongoing criminal activity. He was released
later that day, and a court appearance on those charges still has
not yet
been scheduled.
You can read about Abodeely's arrest in my newsletter at:
http://www.eogn.com/archives/news0331.htm, in the Des Moines
register at
http://www.dmregister.com/news/stories/c4788998/21905604.html and at
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&q=elias+abodeely+arrest
ed&btnG=Google+Search.

His arrest did not slow Abodeely very much. A month later he appeared
selling "self-renewing" genealogy CD-ROM disks under the name
GenealogyTechs.com. That site actually was registered to Andrew
Abodeely. I
obtained one of these "self-renewing" genealogy CD-ROM disks and
wrote about
it in detail in the September 29, 2003 Plus Edition of
this newsletter.
GenealogyTechs.com was shut down the day after my article was
published.

Things have been quiet for the past three months, but on January 2,
2004, a
number of newsletter readers reported receiving some fishy-looking
spam mail
messages. In fact, the messages appear to be word-for-word the same
as the
old ads for "self-renewing" genealogy CD-ROM disks sent earlier from
GenealogyTechs.com - except that the new ads are coming from
GenealogyTechs.net. That's right: the only difference is the
previously shut
down dot-COM is now replaced by a newly-registered dot-NET.

A quick check of the WHOIS information shows that Genealogytechs.net is
registered to the same address as GenealogyTechs.com: 1013 Agate
Street,
Suite B, San Diego, CA 92109, the business address of Andrew
Abodeely. That
is also the same address that ships the worthless "self-renewing"
genealogy
CD-ROM disks.

In short, the Abodeelys seem to have reappeared after a three-month
hiatus.
Elias Abodeely's earlier arrest for felonies doesn't seem to have fazed
either of the Abodeelys at all. At the time these words are being
written,
http://www.genealogytechs.net is up and running and looks almost
identical
to the previously shut down http://www.genealogytechs.com.

It is also interesting to note that the new site is like the old one in
several respects, especially in that it cannot handle credit cards.
Instead, the buyer is suckered into paying by an "e-check" that
extracts
money directly from the buyer's checking account with no credit card
involved. Beware! This is one
method by which the earlier sites allegedly extracted money time
and again
from a buyer's checking accounts! Several buyers thought they paid
once but,
after examining their end-of-month checking account statements,
found that
they had been charged time and again without permission. That is
one of the
actions that led to Elias Abodeely's arrest.

Why would a company not offer payment by credit card? That is
extremely rare
in the online world. The answer is simple: the owner's credit
rating is so
poor that he cannot obtain the merchant account required to be able to
accept credit cards. In this case, he cannot even obtain a PayPal
account,
which is easy
for mostpeople to obtain. No credit card service will give a merchant
account to someone awaiting trial on charges of money laundering by
using
credit cards!
Without access to a credit card merchant account, the Web site owner is
forced to resort to online checks, a risky method for any buyer
considering
an online purchase.

Remember that purchases made online with VISA, MasterCard or American
Express are fully insured against fraud by the credit card
companies. If you
get "ripped off" by a shady merchant when using a credit card, the
credit
card companies will immediately refund all of your money and then will
pursue
resolution with the merchant. PayPal transactions are also fully
insured in
the same manner. However, if you pay by check, you have no such
protection.
That is true both for paper checks as well as for "e-checks." You
receive
only whatever insurance your local bank provides. Sadly, most banks
provide
no protection at all against fraudulent purchases made with a check
or with
a debit card.

Send a check to a con artist? You lose.

Any time you see a Web site offering something for sale and not
accepting
credit cards, ask yourself, "Why does this merchant not accept
credit cards?
Not even via PayPal?" Most of the time, it is because that merchant has
severe financial problems. Then ask yourself if you really want to do
business with
such a merchant.

If you receive a spam mail from GenealogyTechs.net or any
similar-sounding
scam, please forward it to the Cedar Rapids, Iowa, Police Department's
Financial Crimes Division
at . I
suspect they have an interest in the "business activities" of this
person,
who is awaiting a court appearance after being arrested by that
department.
Please feel free to also enclose a copy of this article. You can
read more
about the Cedar Rapids, Iowa, Police Department's Financial Crimes
Division
at http://www.cedar-rapids.org/police/financial_crimes.asp.

Please feel free to also forward this article to other genealogists,
newsgroups, mailing lists, and anywhere else you feel is appropriate.


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