On June 13th 2013, Acre’s Public Prosecutors were granted an injunction against TelexFree. Amongst other things, this injunction saw TelexFree face fines of R$100,000 a day ($42,500 USD) if they signed up any more Brazilian affiliate investors or paid out any existing ones.

Since then it’s been an open secret that top Brazilian affiliates have instructed their downlines to resign with TelexFree fraudulently using bogus details. Typically the credentials used suggest that Brazilians signing up as TelexFree investors are doing so from the US.

As of yet Acre’s Public Prosecutor’s haven’t made a move on this issue, although the Judge handling the case recently demanded TelexFree hand over their affiliate database.

Suggesting that an investigation is underway and fines might be forthcoming, TelexFree lawyer Andé Andrade summed up the current situation to iG:

I have no way of knowing if your registration is made by you from Brazil or by someone who lives in the United States.

Telexfree does not accept registration of affiliates in Brazil. We are very clear about it.

Now, if you are on the site (…), and put in U.S. data, with a (credit) card that is registered in the United States, I have no way to say whether you are who you say you are. I can not investigate whether you are who you say you are.

iG note that TelexFree ‘deny responsibility for any payments made ​​by the company to affiliates in Brazil‘. They also observe that it’s entirely possible to select Brazil as a country of residence when depositing investment funds with TelexFree’s payment processor, i-Payout.

The payment system used by the company, called an eWallet, also allows the indication of Brazil as a place of residence.

Debit cards used for withdrawals, according to affiliates, can normally be sent to Brazil and used for withdrawals at least seven Brazilian banks.

According to Andrade, Telexfree International does not have to control these transfers.

“The payments are made ​​using international credit cards. (As TelexFree) I do not have to know what the fate of that payment is,” said the lawyer.

“As Telexfree, I have no control over the issuance of debit cards [ through the eWallet]. They have control over shipping it somewhere as they are the company operating the card.”

Sorry what? [Continue reading…]

There is no information on the Income4Ads website indicating who owns or runs the business.

The Income4Ads website domain (“income4ads.com”) was registered on the 30th of November 2013, and lists a John Stephenson as the domain owner.

I punched the provided registration address (“1574 Chandler Hollow Road Pittsburgh, PA 15219”), and Google said it didn’t exist (tried some variations too).

The Income4Ads website is hosted in Russia, broken English features on the company website, their marketing videos are voiced over by someone with a middle-eastern or Indian accent, and John Stephenson is a generic an Anglo-Saxon name as they come. Put all of that together and I was already suspicious as to whether or not John Stephenson was an actual person.

My suspicions were confirmed when I visited the website Income4Ads uses to host the “how it works” marketing video:

As above, that gave me an email address and affiliate referral code to go off. The email address turned up nothing but turns out that same referral code has been used in other MLM opportunities:

The two that caught my eye were Wazzub and TextCashNetwork but there was also a bunch of non-MLM “pay to click” schemes tied to the code.

The TextCashNetwork result above took me to a Blogger account, belonging to Muhammad Sarfraz Awan:

On his LinkedIn profile Awan lists himself as being based out of Pakistan and working as an “Accounts Officer” at Islamabad Feeds (Pvt) Ltd:

By tracking his commonly used affiliate referral code, Awan has clearly been involved in various MLM opportunities to date. Income4Ads however appears to be his first venture on the executive side of things.

As suspected, John Stephenson does not appear to be an actual person.

Read on for a full review of the Income4Ads MLM business opportunity. [Continue reading…]

The Traiborg Privacy Policy states that Traiborg is ‘owned by Creaciones Traiborg, S.L.‘ The company’s “Anti-Spam Policy” goes on to specifically name a “Traian Borgovan” who, as per the Traiborg website domain registration, owns Creaciones Traiborg S.L.

The Traiborg website domain registration also provides a corporate address for Creaciones Traiborg S.L. in Andalusia (Spain) is also provided, indicating that this is where Traiborg are operating out of.

It’s noted that the company’s name, Traiborg, appears to originate from the splicing of Borgovan’s first and surnames (Traian Borgovan).

On the MLM history side of things, Borgovan (right) lists Revenue Times ($10 investment scheme) and GlobAllShare (social network shares) as “groups and interests” on his LinkedIn profile.

Pinning down a launch date for Traiborg was a bit of a challenge, but it appears the company officially launched it’s MLM affiliate business in mid to early 2013.

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

Over the last few days a veritable sea of information has been released pertaining to TelexFree’s sponsorship of the Bazillian football club, Botafogo.

Patrick Pretty’s covered the Botafogo story and subsequent fallout with their main sponsor, Viton 44.

This morning the latest on the Botafogo story comes from Alessandra Marques, of the Acre Public Prosecutor’s Office:

Botafogo could be harmed by accepting sponsorship from Telexfree, now accused of being the biggest financial pyramid the history of Brazil with warnings issued in at least two more countries.

According to the prosecutor Alessandra Marques, responsible for the action that blocked the deal in Brazil, the freezing of assets of members of Telexfree can, in theory, include funds from the contract with the club, even if the funds are held external (to TelexFree).

As interesting as it is to watch the prospect of Acre seizing TelexFree investor funds transferred to Botafogo develop, of far more significance were comments made by Marques on US radio. [Continue reading…]

Earlier this week I published a review on the BidForMyMeds business opportunity. Key issues identified in the review was the misleading presentation of BidRx’s executive management as that of BidForMyMeds, a lack of disclosure as to who was actually running BidForMyMeds, and concerns over what was essentially a $17 a month chain recruitment scheme.

Within 6 hours of the BehindMLM review going live, BidForMyMeds got in touch and demand that I ‘immediately post a retraction‘. An Andrew Longcore, claiming to be BidForMyMeds “corporate attorney”, claimed that the review was ‘filled with false and misleading information‘. [Continue reading…]

When a Ponzi scheme starts to suspect it might be large enough to attract the attention of regulators, typically one of two things happens:

1. The owners, who may or may not be publicly known, disappear and either shut the company down or hand it over to someone else… or
2. Psuedo-compliance is brought in, with the company washing its hands of any wrong-doing and henceforth blaming its affiliates for promoting the opportunity “out of compliance” and misrepresenting it.

The idea behind the second one is the operators pretty much figure regulators shutting them down is a done deal, so they figure they’ll pretend they had no idea what was going on and just blame everything on their investors.

Guess which option WCM777 Ponzi operator Phil Ming Xu opted for?

Both… [Continue reading…]

With every motion TelexFree has filed in Acre being dismissed or denied and a Judge now sifting through thousands of pages of evidence, things appear to be getting increasingly desperate.

Appearing to have learnt nothing after recently being fined for wasting the court’s time, TelexFree latest hair-brained ploy continues the company’s tradition of ill-advised legal strategies.

Refusing to give up on the notion that the Acre court will permit one of the largest Ponzi schemes Brazil has ever seen to restart, TelexFree have approached Acre’s Public Prosecutors with a new proposal.

Submitted in court on Wednesday January 8th, in a nutshell TelexFree are proposing to refund affiliate investors, on the proviso they be permitted to restart the Ponzi scheme in Brazil. [Continue reading…]

The BidForMyMeds website doesn’t actually contain any information on the company itself.

Where the owner information for BidForMyMeds should be, the company displays information about BidsRX, naming Ralph Kalies as Founder and CEO of BidsRx. Given that the page is titled “About Us”, this is extremely misleading.

As far as I can tell, BidsRx and BidForMyMeds have nothing to do with eachother.

The BidsForMyMeds website does mention that they are “powered by BidRx”, but business wise there’s doesn’t seem to be any connection. Certainly not any that would justify putting BidRx’s executive staff on the BidForMyMeds “About” page.

Meanwhile the BidForMyMeds website domain (“bidformymeds.com”) was registered on the 21st of October 2013, with the registration naming a “Craig Berens” as the owner.

I wasn’t able to find any additional MLM history on Berens, indicating that BidForMyMeds is his first MLM venture. Berens name also does not appear anywhere on the BidsRx website.

The BidForMyMeds website domain uses a Michigan based address, which appears to be where the company is based out of. The BidForMyMeds Terms and Conditions state

Michigan law will govern and enforce this Agreement. Any litigation or arbitration arising out of the use of this website will take place in any state court located within Kent County.

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

Bitcoin Economy is currently in prelaunch with an announced launch set for February 3rd 2014.

The company’s website domain is registered anonymously (“bitcoin-economy.com”, registered 29th November 2013), however the Bitcoin Economy “Terms and Conditions” indicate that the company is registered in Seychelles (a known tax-haven):

This site (excluding third party linked sites) is controlled by the Company from its offices within the State of Seychelles.

Both you and the Company agree that the statutes and laws of Seychelles shall apply to any actions or claims arising out of or on relation to this Agreement or your use of this site.

The Bitcoin Economy affiliate agreement appears to contradict this, stating that

the formation, construction, interpretation, and enforceability of your contract with Bitcoin-Economy as set forth in this Affiliate Agreement and any incorporated documents shall be governed by and interpreted in all respects under the laws of the Netherlands without regard to conflict of law provisions.

Adding more confusion to the mix, the Bitcoin Economy affiliate agreement goes on to state that affiliates are entering

into contract with Direct Selling Global News, Ltd., doing business as “Bitcoin-Economy.”

I couldn’t find any specific information on Direct Selling Global News Ltd., but in the Bitcoin Economy FAQ the company discloses they use Hong Kong based banking channels:

Direct Selling Global News Ltd.
Account number: 848-535290-838
RM 2106 21/F Lemmi Ctr
50 Hoi Yuen RD
Kwun Tong KLN, Kowloon, Hong Kong

Bank info:

HSBC Bank
Head Office, 1 Queen’s Road Central
Hong Kong
SWIFT: HSBCHKHHHKH

Named on the Bitcoin Economy website as CEO of the company is Martin Bylsma (right). On his Bitcoin Economy corporate bio Bylsma is credited with having worked at Vemma (Managing Director, Europe), Agel Enterprises (“GM” for Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg and Iceland), ACN (Director of Field Support, Europe) and Amway (General Manger, Europe).

On his LinkedIn profile, Bylsma lists himself as operating out of Amsterdam in Norway.

Bitcoin Economy don’t explain why they are using Hong Kong based banking channels, however they do state why they are registered in Seychelles in their FAQ:

Why is the company holding founded in the Seychelles?

As most other classic offshore companies, a Seychelles International Business Company (IBC) is a tax-free corporation designed for engagement into all forms of international business, with no reporting and minimum record-keeping requirements, and comprehensive confidentiality features.

A Seychelles IBC, by the definition of the law, is not subject to any tax or duty on income or profits. It just did not make sense to incorporate our Internet/ Bitcoin company in the USA, Europe or Asia.

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

When we last checked in on Rippln, we noted that the company had gone suspiciously quiet for a few weeks. I say suspiciously because prior to the silence it was a task in itself to sift through Rippln’s hype machine and keep track of the company.

Firing back through Troy Dooly (who “works for some of the investors in Rippln”), CEO Brian Underwood (right) explained that the lack of communication was due to US holidays.

[2:38] I said Brian you’ve been silent, what’s happening?

He said “what are you talking about, it’s Thanksgiving. Some of us left down and went to Thanksgiving prior, some afterwards

We’re still conducting business. Matter of fact we do two calls a week, that isn’t being silent.

Now we haven’t done blog posts and stuff. I can’t win for losing, with you or these other critics.

If I make too much noise, you guys tell me I’m hyping this stuff. If I don’t make any noise cuz we’re working, then we’re “running” or we’re having a eulogy or some crap like that.

Shortly after Underwood’s response, Rippln released its long-awaited Communicator App… and then things went quiet again. A few posts popped up on Rippln’s Facebook page during December, with the last one a Christmas message dated December 25th.

Almost a fortnight later there’s been nothing from Rippln corporate, with affiliates once again left wondering what is going on:

No doubt Underwood’s answer would be “well it’s Christmas and New Years, can’t we get a break”, and for that reason I was going to leave writing a followup till mid January or so.

I say “was” because yesterday news broke that this time around, there might be an entirely different reason for Rippln’s silence. One that strikes at and threatens the future of the company altogether… [Continue reading…]