Richmond Berks claim to be an

international company that traces its history back to 2008.

Two young businessmen John Richmond and Klint Berks met at an auction, fighting over one and the same lot.

One year later together with two other brokers they founded a company that specialized in purchase of real estate at auctions and its further resale at the secondary market.

In 2016 due to the conflict of interests, Richmond and Berks sold their company shares and founded a new corporation – Richmond Berks.

This aligns with the September 29th, 2016 registration of the Richmond Berks company website domain.

That’s about all that aligns however, with there being no information on either John Richmond or Klint Berks predating the launch of Richmond Berks a few months ago.

No detailed biographies for either men are provided on the Richmond Berks website. The website domain itself was registered anonymously.

This is highly suspicious and raises the question of whether these individuals actually even exist.

As always, if an MLM company is not openly upfront about who is running or owns it, think long and hard about joining and/or handing over any money. [Continue reading…]

7K Metals launched earlier this year and are based out of Idaho in the US.

Zach Davis, Josh Anderson and Richard Hansen are cited as co-founders, with Sam Cook serving as 7K Metals’ CEO.

Richard Hansen’s and Sam Cook’s 7K Metals corporate bios identify respective precious metals collecting and mining management backgrounds.

The MLM side of the business appears to be driven by Zach Davis and Josh Anderson (left and right respectively).

Zach Davis first learned the power of referral marketing as a college student.

From his first experience in the industry to his most recent he has helped thousands of people realize their ability to make a more significant contribution to the world.

Josh Anderson got his first taste of network marketing at the age of 21. He was able to build a large team that focused on other people’s success. That team reached over 18,000 people in its first year.

In 2008 Josh, influenced a new MLM company that in 120 days grow to 9,000 people, at which time Josh become the CEO of the company and lead the company to over 26,000 distributors.

Davis and Anderson together run Black Ink International, an MLM training company they founded in 2011.

On his LinkedIn profile, Anderson cites himself as the CEO of JD Premium from 2009 to 2011.

JD Premium marketed a range of nutrition and personal care products. The company was shut down by owner Roger Ball in 2015.

Zach Davis served as JD Premium’s Chief Marketing Officer from 2009 to 2011.

In addition to running Black Ink International with Anderson, in 2012 Davis was also a Paycation affiliate.

BehindMLM reviewed Paycation in 2014 and found it to be a travel niche recruitment opportunity.

Read on for a full review of the 7K Metals MLM opportunity. [Continue reading…]

Following a hearing held on December 21st, the TelexFree victim claim deadline has been extended until March 15th, 2017. [Continue reading…]

Austria’s White Collar Crimes and Corruption” Public Prosecutor’s Office (WKSTA) has a long history with Lyoness.

WKSTA has been trying to hold Lyoness and founder Hubert Freidl criminally accountable for years.

Unfortunately for the regulator, legal decisions have thus far gone against them.

Rather than resign themselves to a new era of legalized Ponzi fraud in Austria however, WKSTA continues to try to stop the Lyoness Ponzi scheme.

The latest move by the regulator is a new criminal lawsuit filed yesterday. [Continue reading…]

Marketing material for Ad Pack Pro suggests the company launched in mid 2015. The Ad Pack Pro website domain however (“adpackpro-international.com”), was only registered earlier this year in March.

A corporate address in Switzerland is provided on the Ad Pack Pro website. Further research reveals a number of businesses using the same address, suggesting it is rented virtual office space.

Peter Müller (right) is cited as CEO of Ad Pack Pro, which itself is owned by parent company OneVision Holding.

Many creative and intelligend [sic] people with a common vision – that is the OneVision Holding AG.

The basic idea of the founders to combine the Know-How of several experts from different sectors, as well as their networks, to create a [sic] innovative Online Company, arose in May, 2015.

Possibly due to language-barriers, I was unable to put together an MLM history on Peter Müller.

Infact outside of Ad Pack Pro, there doesn’t appear to be any information on Peter Müller online. This could again be due to language-barriers but I’m flagging it as suspicious nonetheless.

Read on for a full review of the Ad Pack Pro MLM opportunity. [Continue reading…]

Engofor initially launched as “Cryptocoins Invest” back in June.

The company hosting the Cryptocoins Invest website appears to have since terminated the site with it today showing an “account suspended” message.

Rather than acknowledge this, those running Cryptocoins Invest have trotted out a sob story involving hackers:

To our dismay we realized that the hackers have caused more damage to the CCI network than we initially thought.

They succeeded to manipulate the system that there are now quite a number of accounts at another final balance than expected.

This, both positively and negatively. It has proved impossible to recover the data.

How much money has so far been lost is unclear. A relaunch as Engofor was announced last month which, as I understand it, is pretty much the same business model.

A corporate address in the Netherlands is provided on the Engofor website. No information about who owns or runs the company is provided.

Further research reveals Diego van der Veen (owner), Wendy van Dijk and David Vink as co-CEOs of the company.

These do appear to be actual people, however due to language-barriers I was unable to put together an MLM history on any of them.

Update 28th December 2016 – The Engofor website now credits Diego van der Veen as “Founding Director” of the company. Wendy van Dijk is credited as “Financial Support”.

Generic corporate bios for both on the Engofor website don’t actually reveal anything about their MLM history. /end update

Read on for a full review of the Engofor MLM opportunity. [Continue reading…]

Wealth Generators launched in 2013 and are based out of Utah in the US.

The company operates in the financial services MLM niche, with a specific focus on stock market trading.

Recently the Wealth Generators has caught the attention of Colombia’s Superintendencia Financiera regulatory body, who claim it’s a pyramid scheme. [Continue reading…]

Karatbars International are one of the pioneers of the gold recruitment MLM business model.

Under the guise of purchasing gold, Karatbars’ business model sees affiliates pay a fee and are then paid to recruit others who pay a fee.

In 2014 Canadian regulator Autorité des marchés financiers (AMF) issued a warning against Karatbars.

The warning was reinforced with legal action, which has been playing out over these past two years. [Continue reading…]

Following a scathing summary judgement decision that saw USFIA labelled a Ponzi scheme and Steve Chen the scammer who operated it, the SEC’s case against USFIA seemed all but over.

Despite effectively losing the case, Steve Chen is still fighting it out to the bitter end. [Continue reading…]

My Advertising Pays was initially launched in 2013 by Mike Deese.

The premise was simple enough, invest $50 and receive a $55 ROI. Wash, rinse and repeat.

Unfortunately the only verifiable source of revenue entering My Advertising Pays was affiliate investment, making it a Ponzi scheme.

My Advertising Pays first collapsed in mid 2015. In an effort to keep the scam going, US investor ROIs were cancelled and Deese (right) relaunched in Europe.

That lasted about a year, with My Advertising Pays again collapsing in mid 2016.

Another reboot was announced last month, however that appears to have already been scrapped.

A consistent theme with My Advertising Pays’ relaunched is the fact that most affiliates aren’t paid. This doesn’t seem to affect the top investors, who regularly boast about luxury purchases on social media:

Mike Deese himself seems to be flush with cash, as evidenced by the purchase of a $600,000 home in Mississippi earlier this year:

Affiliates meanwhile are told My Advertising Pays can’t pay them because VX Gateway, their former payment processor, ran off with $60 million in invested funds.

A lawsuit has been filed to that effect and is still playing out in court.

Now under the name “The Advert Platform”, My Advertising Pays is gearing up to relaunch for a third time. [Continue reading…]