A Melbourne real estate agent was jailed this week for two years after duping an elderly man in to sell his property to him for less than half the value.
real estate business
Monday, August 31, 2009
Saturday, August 29, 2009
Tassie - A healthy island state for innovation
ENTREPRENEUR: Morris Kaplan | August 29, 2009
TASMANIA is well endowed with natural beauty and resources; it is also a hub for innovation and entrepreneurship with companies such as Tassal and Tasmanian Alkaloids on the global stage.
Local entrepreneur John Elkerton who is co-founder and chief executive of burgeoning e-health provider Healthcare Software, says there are advantages in being a business in Tasmania.
"I live in the bush with wallabies and echidnas in the back garden yet I can walk to my Hobart office in 30 minutes," he says. "It's a nice way to live and do business. I think as a smaller player we can be more strategic."
He says e-health, a nascent industry that enables the transition away from paper to electronic records, offers vast potential for his fledgling business.
"Most people assume that whenever they seek medical assistance then people who are to treat them have access to their previous medical record," Elkerton says.
"The reality is that the clinician can only ever see the records that accumulate at that point. A GP only has their record; a hospital only has your record for your stay at that hospital. Such poor communication results in less than ideal treatment choices. In an emergency situation, say you had an allergy to morphine and you're on holiday and have an accident and they give you morphine. That's a potentially life-threatening situation. It's a stark reminder of the lack of a unified record, amazing in this day and age."
Established in 2005, Healthcare Software has developed a clinical suite of software for hospitals to manage medications, patient referrals, discharge summaries, electronic prescribing, as well as lab and radiology results.
The software takes away the "old school" method of pen and paper, and streamlines communication between the hospital, community care providers and healthcare professionals.
The company, whose applications have already been implemented in 17 major hospitals throughout Tasmania and South Australia, is looking to increase that to 35 by this time next year.
Elkerton and his 12 staff are focusing their efforts on entering other states, as well as branching out internationally into New Zealand and Singapore. "Healthcare in Australia still revolves around pen, paper and human memory," he says. "Medication errors cause more deaths every year in Australia than the road toll.
"Our product significantly increases patient safety by reducing medication errors and adverse drug reactions."
Privacy hurdles and the fact technology hasn't fully arrived in health are certainly a cause for disquiet, but the mix is a veritable petri dish for an entrepreneur: a problem looking for a solution.
Elkerton's "problem" emerged during his 13 years in clinical (hospital) pharmacy in Australia and Britain.
"My work was all paper-based," he says.
"There was a folder with a patient record in it. Patient leaves hospital; commonly, the pharmacist's clinical record is destroyed or lost. I thought surely there must be some value in having an application that brought together all the information that a clinician or pharmacist required as well as being the point to further document and access for the future.
"It was a common paradigm then that hospitals were bypassed by the 90s IT revolution. Even today, an admission into hospital will result in a substantial bound-paper record of your stay in hospital."
Elkerton says the opportunity presented itself as a simple set of numbers.
"A medium-sized hospital may have a dozen of more clinical pharmacists doing the basic bottle labelling as well as being out on the ward talking to the doctors, nurses; educating patients. It piqued my interest. If there were so many people in this role, surely there would be an appetite for a solution which would support their activity."
He says his early days in business were focused on developing software.
"I dealt with the full range of health professionals, (but) I knew my weaknesses," he says.
"I was aware of my lack of business experience but I was passionate about the work and its potential to mitigate risks. You build it wrong the first time, but you build it right the second time.
"In 2005, I partnered with an IT software developer to build a commercial software package. It was a symbiotic relationship. It was 2 1/2 years of development. Apart from a small investment from a Tasmanian incubator fund, it was very lean times for the business. We were lucky to have the (incubator) funds. That kept us going for a while, then we secured a grant from AusIndustry to be able to commercialise and present product to market in 2007-08. The reality is that to develop enterprise software is hugely expensive. It takes a long time and lot of resources to get it there. No one had actually gone down the path of committing to such a substantial undertaking.
"First, it was clinical pharmacy; now we're across all aspects of medication management. The underlying theme ... is of naivety. IT business is not for the faint-hearted; it's a big numbers game.
"IT is hard, especially when you are selling software and health IT is even harder. The sale cycles are so long. The critical success factor for a small to medium-sized IT company in Australia is about gaining contracts. We've been doing this, invariably involving tenders.
"You're up against the mega companies. When we go into bat we are against multinationals. It all adds up to a substantial challenge."
A national electronic health record is a long-term aim of the federal government and opportunities in the IT industry abound.
"This is emerging as a big industry," Elkerton says.
"You've got an ageing population; you have an unsustainable growth of health as a percentage of GDP. It's heading for a train wreck unless we can develop some 21st-century modes for managing health. We have great IT and a very well advanced health system, but we can do better. Denmark is doing well; while the UK has invested a lot of money. We try to stay on that cutting edge of being the latest and the greatest."
TASMANIA is well endowed with natural beauty and resources; it is also a hub for innovation and entrepreneurship with companies such as Tassal and Tasmanian Alkaloids on the global stage.
Local entrepreneur John Elkerton who is co-founder and chief executive of burgeoning e-health provider Healthcare Software, says there are advantages in being a business in Tasmania.
"I live in the bush with wallabies and echidnas in the back garden yet I can walk to my Hobart office in 30 minutes," he says. "It's a nice way to live and do business. I think as a smaller player we can be more strategic."
He says e-health, a nascent industry that enables the transition away from paper to electronic records, offers vast potential for his fledgling business.
"Most people assume that whenever they seek medical assistance then people who are to treat them have access to their previous medical record," Elkerton says.
"The reality is that the clinician can only ever see the records that accumulate at that point. A GP only has their record; a hospital only has your record for your stay at that hospital. Such poor communication results in less than ideal treatment choices. In an emergency situation, say you had an allergy to morphine and you're on holiday and have an accident and they give you morphine. That's a potentially life-threatening situation. It's a stark reminder of the lack of a unified record, amazing in this day and age."
Established in 2005, Healthcare Software has developed a clinical suite of software for hospitals to manage medications, patient referrals, discharge summaries, electronic prescribing, as well as lab and radiology results.
The software takes away the "old school" method of pen and paper, and streamlines communication between the hospital, community care providers and healthcare professionals.
The company, whose applications have already been implemented in 17 major hospitals throughout Tasmania and South Australia, is looking to increase that to 35 by this time next year.
Elkerton and his 12 staff are focusing their efforts on entering other states, as well as branching out internationally into New Zealand and Singapore. "Healthcare in Australia still revolves around pen, paper and human memory," he says. "Medication errors cause more deaths every year in Australia than the road toll.
"Our product significantly increases patient safety by reducing medication errors and adverse drug reactions."
Privacy hurdles and the fact technology hasn't fully arrived in health are certainly a cause for disquiet, but the mix is a veritable petri dish for an entrepreneur: a problem looking for a solution.
Elkerton's "problem" emerged during his 13 years in clinical (hospital) pharmacy in Australia and Britain.
"My work was all paper-based," he says.
"There was a folder with a patient record in it. Patient leaves hospital; commonly, the pharmacist's clinical record is destroyed or lost. I thought surely there must be some value in having an application that brought together all the information that a clinician or pharmacist required as well as being the point to further document and access for the future.
"It was a common paradigm then that hospitals were bypassed by the 90s IT revolution. Even today, an admission into hospital will result in a substantial bound-paper record of your stay in hospital."
Elkerton says the opportunity presented itself as a simple set of numbers.
"A medium-sized hospital may have a dozen of more clinical pharmacists doing the basic bottle labelling as well as being out on the ward talking to the doctors, nurses; educating patients. It piqued my interest. If there were so many people in this role, surely there would be an appetite for a solution which would support their activity."
He says his early days in business were focused on developing software.
"I dealt with the full range of health professionals, (but) I knew my weaknesses," he says.
"I was aware of my lack of business experience but I was passionate about the work and its potential to mitigate risks. You build it wrong the first time, but you build it right the second time.
"In 2005, I partnered with an IT software developer to build a commercial software package. It was a symbiotic relationship. It was 2 1/2 years of development. Apart from a small investment from a Tasmanian incubator fund, it was very lean times for the business. We were lucky to have the (incubator) funds. That kept us going for a while, then we secured a grant from AusIndustry to be able to commercialise and present product to market in 2007-08. The reality is that to develop enterprise software is hugely expensive. It takes a long time and lot of resources to get it there. No one had actually gone down the path of committing to such a substantial undertaking.
"First, it was clinical pharmacy; now we're across all aspects of medication management. The underlying theme ... is of naivety. IT business is not for the faint-hearted; it's a big numbers game.
"IT is hard, especially when you are selling software and health IT is even harder. The sale cycles are so long. The critical success factor for a small to medium-sized IT company in Australia is about gaining contracts. We've been doing this, invariably involving tenders.
"You're up against the mega companies. When we go into bat we are against multinationals. It all adds up to a substantial challenge."
A national electronic health record is a long-term aim of the federal government and opportunities in the IT industry abound.
"This is emerging as a big industry," Elkerton says.
"You've got an ageing population; you have an unsustainable growth of health as a percentage of GDP. It's heading for a train wreck unless we can develop some 21st-century modes for managing health. We have great IT and a very well advanced health system, but we can do better. Denmark is doing well; while the UK has invested a lot of money. We try to stay on that cutting edge of being the latest and the greatest."
Paper records need binning
THE transition away from paper to electronic records is referred to as e-health and is becoming one of the hottest topics in health and IT.
For good reason. A recent report commissioned by the Rudd government highlighted the high occurrence of death and injury caused through medical error and miscommunication between care providers and patients.
It is estimated more people die as a direct result of these errors than are killed on Australia's roads each year.
To meet the vast demands of the health sector, solutions have been developed for all segments of the industry, providing support from administration to clinical areas.
These solutions are provided through a variety of sources, from the more traditional method of an on-site stand-alone server to the emerging trend of web-based platforms, which enable greater flexibility in the delivery and management of patient care.
John EIkerton, chief executive of Healthcare Software, says if you are a typical middle-aged Australian, you will have had several hospital visits, consulted more than one GP and collected prescriptions from any number of community pharmacies.
"So where is your medical record?" he says. "In most cases, each of these locations will hold a fragment of your record and to date there is no widespread collation of these details.
"The question is: how can the hospital, GP or other carer make the best decisions for your health when they cannot get a complete picture of a medical history?"
While businesses rely mostly on computerised records, this is not the case in our hospitals where documentation of patient results and treatment is still primarily paper-based.
Morris Kaplan The Australian 29 aug 09
Friday, August 21, 2009
We're on the home straight
Winner of the grand national electronic conveyancing cup is ....
NECS may well be heading into the home straight, but it would appear the rest of the horses are still not even on the track or only just heading into the starting gates.
The State Governments are still arguing do we enter no duplicate title or do we bet on the rising star being the xml title search?
The Commonwealth Government says they are putting up the prize money but at 100 to 1 no one takes them seriously.
Lawyers are nowhere to be seen. They're still riding on faxes with a copy in the mail. Hardly to be seen is scan and email.
The Banks should be riding on collaborative solutions but they appear to have entered their pony into the Hong Kong Jockey Club Stakes or was that Bangalore?
With NECS heading into the home straight, it is really looking like a one horse race.
Like any memorable Melbourne Cup race (think phar lap 1930, jean shrimpton 1965, damien oliver 2002, makybe diva 3 back to back wins) you need all the horses in the starting gates at the same time and a close finish.
Its no point watching NECS heading up the home straight for an uncontested win. If unattended settlements is the finish line, everyone has to start getting serious.
Training starts at 4am and here are the tasks -
State Governments
Abolish the duplicate certificate of title (or at least publicly state their position on the issue)
Introduce a standardised XML Title Search
Lawyers and Conveyancers
Start using scanning technologies
Banks
Introduce and use collaborative web 2.0 solutions in conjunction with conveyancing practitioners, valuers and mortgage insurers. If banks need convincing on the merits of collarboration, a recent quote from New York Times interview with John T. Chambers, chairman and chief executive of Cisco Systems is on the mark. Q. What’s changed in the last few years? A. Big time, the importance of collaboration. Big time, people who have teamwork skills, and their use of technology. If they’re not collaborative, if they aren’t naturally inclined toward collaboration and teamwork, if they are uncomfortable with using technology to make that happen both within Cisco and in their own life, they’re probably not going to fit in here.
The reality is that old ways of conveyancing will eventually die. However, lawyers and conveyancers will move at different speeds, so industry and government should be focused on matters that will still value the old but transition them to the new. There has to be a transition from old paper technologies which have been in use in the current form more or less for the past 150 years and probably for the next 10 plus years. This means incremental changes which we have already seen such as the change from paper searches to online title searches.
Back to the racing analogy, we know where finish line is and that is unattended settlements. This is not a short sprint, but like the Melbourne Cup the race covers a distance of 3,200 metres. Just to qualify for the Melbourne Cup there are a number of lead-up races which I will cover in future newsletters.
247legal August Newsletter
NECS may well be heading into the home straight, but it would appear the rest of the horses are still not even on the track or only just heading into the starting gates.The State Governments are still arguing do we enter no duplicate title or do we bet on the rising star being the xml title search?
The Commonwealth Government says they are putting up the prize money but at 100 to 1 no one takes them seriously.
Lawyers are nowhere to be seen. They're still riding on faxes with a copy in the mail. Hardly to be seen is scan and email.
The Banks should be riding on collaborative solutions but they appear to have entered their pony into the Hong Kong Jockey Club Stakes or was that Bangalore?
With NECS heading into the home straight, it is really looking like a one horse race.
Like any memorable Melbourne Cup race (think phar lap 1930, jean shrimpton 1965, damien oliver 2002, makybe diva 3 back to back wins) you need all the horses in the starting gates at the same time and a close finish.
Its no point watching NECS heading up the home straight for an uncontested win. If unattended settlements is the finish line, everyone has to start getting serious.
Training starts at 4am and here are the tasks -
State Governments
Abolish the duplicate certificate of title (or at least publicly state their position on the issue)
Introduce a standardised XML Title Search
Lawyers and Conveyancers
Start using scanning technologies
Banks
Introduce and use collaborative web 2.0 solutions in conjunction with conveyancing practitioners, valuers and mortgage insurers. If banks need convincing on the merits of collarboration, a recent quote from New York Times interview with John T. Chambers, chairman and chief executive of Cisco Systems is on the mark. Q. What’s changed in the last few years? A. Big time, the importance of collaboration. Big time, people who have teamwork skills, and their use of technology. If they’re not collaborative, if they aren’t naturally inclined toward collaboration and teamwork, if they are uncomfortable with using technology to make that happen both within Cisco and in their own life, they’re probably not going to fit in here.
The reality is that old ways of conveyancing will eventually die. However, lawyers and conveyancers will move at different speeds, so industry and government should be focused on matters that will still value the old but transition them to the new. There has to be a transition from old paper technologies which have been in use in the current form more or less for the past 150 years and probably for the next 10 plus years. This means incremental changes which we have already seen such as the change from paper searches to online title searches.
Back to the racing analogy, we know where finish line is and that is unattended settlements. This is not a short sprint, but like the Melbourne Cup the race covers a distance of 3,200 metres. Just to qualify for the Melbourne Cup there are a number of lead-up races which I will cover in future newsletters.
247legal August Newsletter
Client Identity Verification - NECS
In the electronic environment of NECS the transacting parties will not generally sign Land Registry instruments. Instead they will authorize a Subscriber to do so on their behalf. It is, therefore, essential that the Subscriber is satisfied about the identity of their Client.
The standard of Client Identity Verification is a critical risk mitigation measure in NECS. It gives all of the participants in a NECS transaction confidence about who they are dealing with. After considering the existing options for a CIV standard the National Project Team came to the conclusion that there needs to be a purpose-built standard for NECS. The standard will need to facilitate electronic property transactions, be compatable with current banking industry practice and expected future legal and conveyancing industry practices under the Anti Money Laundering legislation, and satisfy the Land Registries concerns for mitigating fraud and minimising compensation claims on their assurance funds.
More work is currently being done on determining the detail of the CIV standard for NECS and how it will be applied in particular circumstances.
NECS newsletter Aug 09
Tanner rules out e-conveyancing cash
The Australian
Chris Merritt | August 21, 2009
THE appointment of Peter Harris to a senior role in the federal public service coincides with the government's refusal to provide $20 million in seed funding for the national e-conveyancing system.
Finance Minister Lindsay Tanner and Deregulation Minister Craig Emerson have outlined the government's position in a letter to Les Taylor, who chairs the national electronic conveyancing system steering committee.
Mr Taylor, a former general counsel of the Commonwealth Bank, had warned in May that unless repayable seed funding of $20m was provided for the national project, it was at risk of "complete failure".
In their response, Mr Tanner and Dr Emerson told Mr Taylor that the federal government had already agreed to give the states $550m as part of an agreement in which the states would undertake 27 projects, including a national e-conveyancing system.
That agreement includes payment of $100m in "up-front facilitation funding in 2008-09".
"Facilitation funding is not tied to any specific reform and its allocation is a decision for the states and territories," they wrote.
"It is the view of the commonwealth that this amount is sufficient to fulfil these obligations and no further funding will be allocated to facilitate delivery of the agreed reforms."
The agreement with the states shows that none of the $550m has been earmarked for the e-conveyancing system.
If the states fail to meet their commitment to establish the system, they could still receive their full reward payments from the commonwealth so long as they make progress in other areas covered by the agreement.
PS chief linked to $50m e-conveyancing failure
Chris Merritt, Legal affairs editor | August 21, 2009
Article from: The Australian
ONE of the federal government's top public servants has been accused of having a vested interest in ensuring that Victoria's troubled e-conveyancing system becomes a template for the promised national system.
Peter Harris, who is about to take office as secretary of the Department of Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy, was caught in a "hopeless" conflict of interest, according to opposition communications spokesman Nick Minchin.
"This chap will no doubt have a very significant vested interest in the Victorian system being seen as the template for a national system," Senator Minchin said. "It will reflect enormously badly on him if that is not the case, or if the Victorian system is made utterly redundant."
Before being appointed this week to the federal public service, Mr Harris ran the Victorian Department of Sustainability and Environment, which spent at least $50 million building a state-based e-conveyancing system.
If the long-promised single national system is rolled out, it would call into question the continued need for a separate Victorian system.
"I fear that (Mr Harris) will be hopelessly conflicted," said Senator Minchin.
"It is almost the situation where he would have to declare that conflict of interest and play no part whatsoever in the commonwealth's moves in this area."
However, a spokesman for Communications Minister Stephen Conroy said Mr Harris would be leading a department that had no involvement in the national e-conveyancing project.
Senator Conroy said Mr Harris had extensive public service experience and would be a valuable leader of the department.
Senator Minchin said he was also concerned about whether the troubled history of electronic conveyancing in Victoria meant Mr Harris might not be the best person to run the department during the rollout of the $43billion national broadband network.
While the state government says the system, known as ECV, has processed more than 600 "transactions", it has been boycotted by solicitors and the major banks. As a result, just one of the matters processed by ECV has been a full property settlement.
Senator Minchin said Mr Harris had been head of a state government department "that has had responsibility for what appears to be an unbelievable white elephant and bottomless pit of wasted Victorian government money".
"If you cannot manage the establishment of an electronic conveyancing system in Victoria without it becoming a major flop, then what does that say about the $43bn broadband network?" Senator Minchin asked.
State opposition frontbencher David Davis said Victorians were entitled to be surprised by Mr Harris's appointment.
"This IT white elephant has been overseen by DSE and Mr Harris at an expense of more than $50m and unfortunately not more than one full conveyancing transaction has been completed," he said.
Related article
Poor track record
IT is almost possible to feel sorry for Peter Harris. Before he has even taken office as the new secretary of the department of communications and the digital economy, Nick Minchin is laying into him.
But Harris has an unfortunate track record in Victoria as head of the department that oversaw the construction of the state's electronic conveyancing system, ECV.
It was on Harris's watch that his department churned through $50 million in public money building a conveyancing system that fails to meet the bare minimum requirements of the conveyancing industry.
The Law Institute of Victoria will not recommend it and the major banks will not use it. As head of the department of communications, Harris will not be responsible for electronic conveyancing. But he'll have a key role in the massive national broadband network. That project is so important that Minchin was entirely justified in turning the spotlight on what happened in Victoria.
Article from: The Australian
ONE of the federal government's top public servants has been accused of having a vested interest in ensuring that Victoria's troubled e-conveyancing system becomes a template for the promised national system.
Peter Harris, who is about to take office as secretary of the Department of Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy, was caught in a "hopeless" conflict of interest, according to opposition communications spokesman Nick Minchin."This chap will no doubt have a very significant vested interest in the Victorian system being seen as the template for a national system," Senator Minchin said. "It will reflect enormously badly on him if that is not the case, or if the Victorian system is made utterly redundant."
Before being appointed this week to the federal public service, Mr Harris ran the Victorian Department of Sustainability and Environment, which spent at least $50 million building a state-based e-conveyancing system.
If the long-promised single national system is rolled out, it would call into question the continued need for a separate Victorian system.
"I fear that (Mr Harris) will be hopelessly conflicted," said Senator Minchin.
"It is almost the situation where he would have to declare that conflict of interest and play no part whatsoever in the commonwealth's moves in this area."
However, a spokesman for Communications Minister Stephen Conroy said Mr Harris would be leading a department that had no involvement in the national e-conveyancing project.
Senator Conroy said Mr Harris had extensive public service experience and would be a valuable leader of the department.
Senator Minchin said he was also concerned about whether the troubled history of electronic conveyancing in Victoria meant Mr Harris might not be the best person to run the department during the rollout of the $43billion national broadband network.
While the state government says the system, known as ECV, has processed more than 600 "transactions", it has been boycotted by solicitors and the major banks. As a result, just one of the matters processed by ECV has been a full property settlement.
Senator Minchin said Mr Harris had been head of a state government department "that has had responsibility for what appears to be an unbelievable white elephant and bottomless pit of wasted Victorian government money".
"If you cannot manage the establishment of an electronic conveyancing system in Victoria without it becoming a major flop, then what does that say about the $43bn broadband network?" Senator Minchin asked.
State opposition frontbencher David Davis said Victorians were entitled to be surprised by Mr Harris's appointment.
"This IT white elephant has been overseen by DSE and Mr Harris at an expense of more than $50m and unfortunately not more than one full conveyancing transaction has been completed," he said.
Related article
Poor track record
IT is almost possible to feel sorry for Peter Harris. Before he has even taken office as the new secretary of the department of communications and the digital economy, Nick Minchin is laying into him.
But Harris has an unfortunate track record in Victoria as head of the department that oversaw the construction of the state's electronic conveyancing system, ECV.
It was on Harris's watch that his department churned through $50 million in public money building a conveyancing system that fails to meet the bare minimum requirements of the conveyancing industry.
The Law Institute of Victoria will not recommend it and the major banks will not use it. As head of the department of communications, Harris will not be responsible for electronic conveyancing. But he'll have a key role in the massive national broadband network. That project is so important that Minchin was entirely justified in turning the spotlight on what happened in Victoria.
Tuesday, August 18, 2009
'Soup nazi' hacked 130 million credit cards: prosecutors
August 18, 2009 - The Age - AP
United States prosecutors have charged a Miami man with the nation's largest case of credit and debit card data theft.
Authorities said Albert Gonzales, 28, had broken his own record for identity theft by hacking into more retail networks to steal data from 130 million accounts.
Gonzales, already in jail awaiting trial for allegedly hacking into the computer networks of eight major retailers and stealing data related to 40 million credit cards, was indicted today in New Jersey, charged with conspiring with two other unnamed suspects to steal the private information.
Prosecutors say Gonzales, who is also known online as "soupnazi," targeted customers of convenience store giant 7-Eleven, and supermarket chain Hannaford Brothers. Heartland Payment Systems, a New Jersey-based card payment processor, was also targeted.
Gonzales is awaiting trial in New York for allegedly helping hack the computer network of the national restaurant chain Dave and Buster's. The trial in that case is due to begin next month.
He faces up to 20 years in prison if convicted of the new charges.
The Justice Department said the new case represents the largest alleged credit and debit card data breach ever charged in the United States, beginning in October 2006.
Gonzales allegedly devised a sophisticated attack to penetrate the computer networks, steal the card data, and send that data to computer servers in California, Illinois, Latvia, the Netherlands and Ukraine.
The indictment also charges that Gonzales and his co-conspirators used sophisticated hacker techniques to cover their tracks and avoid detection.
Also last year, the Justice Department announced additional charges against Gonzales and others for hacking retail companies' computers for the theft of approximately 40 million credit cards. At the time, that was believed to be the biggest single case of hacking private computer networks to steal credit card data.
AP
Thursday, August 13, 2009
Man jailed after using Limewire for ID theft
A Seattle man has been sentenced to more than three years in prison for using the LimeWire file-sharing service to lift personal information from computers across the US. The man, Frederick Wood, typed words like 'tax return' and 'account' into the LimeWire search box. That allowed him to find and access computers on the LimeWire network with shared folders that contained tax returns and bank account information. ... He used the information to open accounts, create identification cards and make purchases. 'Many of the victims are parents who don't realize that LimeWire is on their home computer,' [said Kathryn Warma of the US Attorney's Office].
Original Story - PC World
Thursday, August 06, 2009
Myer David Jones caught in $500,000 credit scam
Steve Butcher
August 6, 2009
A STRING of leading Melbourne retail stores — including Melbourne’s premier outlets Myer and David Jones — have been victims of a $500,000 scam whose syndicate ringleaders recruited overseas students.
The stores, which included Dick Smith and JB Hi-Fi, were duped by fake credit cards the students used to buy hundreds of gift cards.
Melbourne Magistrates Court yesterday heard Ching Boon Goh, 25, produced the cards from an embossing machine, blank credit cards and stolen credit cards numbers from overseas. Goh, who added other identification to match the cards, recruited numerous Malaysian and other overseas students to attend the stores between October and January this year.
In documents tendered to court, Goh obtained about $226,000 from the students who bought gift cards, which are basically cash substitutes, valued between $50 and $500.
Goh then onsold the gift cards to other offenders, allegedly including Rubesch Thannanjeyan, for 70 per cent of their value.
example of identity fraud
Monday, August 03, 2009
CBA and Westpac corner mortgage market
Nick Tabakoff | August 03, 2009
Article from: The Australian
AUSTRALIA'S "big two" banks, the Commonwealth and Westpac, have tightened their stranglehold on the national mortgage book by taking more than 85 per cent of new mortgage lending by the banking sector during the June quarter.
The extraordinary growth means the combined size of the mortgage books of the big two has now topped $500 billion for the first time.
A report obtained by The Australian has shown that of the $35.6bn of new mortgage lending achieved during the quarter, the merged CBA/Bankwest and Westpac/St George achieved an extraordinary 85.2 per cent, or $30.3bn, of the growth.
But the growing disparity between the haves and have-nots of the banking sector has seen the head of the Australian Competition & Consumer Commission, Graeme Samuel, reiterate fears about the state of competition between larger and smaller banks.
He said yesterday there was "no one concerned with competition that would say the current situation is healthy".
The new figures released by financial intelligence firm CoreData show the merged Westpac/St George had the fastest-growing mortgage book during the quarter, with $15.2bn in new mortgage lending. CBA/Bankwest grew by $15.1bn.
The figures come days after Australian Prudential Regulatory Authority statistics showed the big four banks dominating deposits and home lending.
Westpac/St George was the aggressive mover for the period, with growth in its mortgage book almost doubling from the combined $7.7bn figure for the March quarter. CBA/Bankwest and Westpac/St George now have just under half of all outstanding mortgages in Australia by value. The enlarged CBA has 25.2 per cent of the market with $260bn, while the merged Westpac has 23.3 per cent with $241bn.
By comparison, National Australia Bank and ANZ combined have 25.5 per cent market share. NAB has a mortgage loan book of $133.9bn and the ANZ $130.4bn. NAB recorded mortgage growth of just 2.2 per cent in the June quarter, while ANZ's growth was 1.8 per cent. While NAB and ANZ record tepid growth, tier-two banks -- as well as foreign-owned banks operating locally -- are losing their small market share.
The big four raised their combined market share of residential lending to a record high of 74.1 per cent during the June quarter, up from 72.2 per cent in the March quarter. But at the end of the June quarter, the tier-two banks -- made up mainly of regionals such as Suncorp, and Bendigo and Adelaide -- had an 11.2 per cent market share, 0.3 per cent below the 11.5 per cent share they recorded at the end of March.
CoreData principal Andrew Inwood said the regional banks, in particular, needed to reinvent themselves after recently trying to match big banks in cutting mortgage interest rates.
"Competing with CBA on price is like trying to compete with Walmart on price," he said. "The regionals should be focusing on their ability to take care of customers in a way with which the big two can't possibly compete."
Article from: The Australian
AUSTRALIA'S "big two" banks, the Commonwealth and Westpac, have tightened their stranglehold on the national mortgage book by taking more than 85 per cent of new mortgage lending by the banking sector during the June quarter.
The extraordinary growth means the combined size of the mortgage books of the big two has now topped $500 billion for the first time.
A report obtained by The Australian has shown that of the $35.6bn of new mortgage lending achieved during the quarter, the merged CBA/Bankwest and Westpac/St George achieved an extraordinary 85.2 per cent, or $30.3bn, of the growth.
But the growing disparity between the haves and have-nots of the banking sector has seen the head of the Australian Competition & Consumer Commission, Graeme Samuel, reiterate fears about the state of competition between larger and smaller banks.
He said yesterday there was "no one concerned with competition that would say the current situation is healthy".
The new figures released by financial intelligence firm CoreData show the merged Westpac/St George had the fastest-growing mortgage book during the quarter, with $15.2bn in new mortgage lending. CBA/Bankwest grew by $15.1bn.
The figures come days after Australian Prudential Regulatory Authority statistics showed the big four banks dominating deposits and home lending.
Westpac/St George was the aggressive mover for the period, with growth in its mortgage book almost doubling from the combined $7.7bn figure for the March quarter. CBA/Bankwest and Westpac/St George now have just under half of all outstanding mortgages in Australia by value. The enlarged CBA has 25.2 per cent of the market with $260bn, while the merged Westpac has 23.3 per cent with $241bn.
By comparison, National Australia Bank and ANZ combined have 25.5 per cent market share. NAB has a mortgage loan book of $133.9bn and the ANZ $130.4bn. NAB recorded mortgage growth of just 2.2 per cent in the June quarter, while ANZ's growth was 1.8 per cent. While NAB and ANZ record tepid growth, tier-two banks -- as well as foreign-owned banks operating locally -- are losing their small market share.
The big four raised their combined market share of residential lending to a record high of 74.1 per cent during the June quarter, up from 72.2 per cent in the March quarter. But at the end of the June quarter, the tier-two banks -- made up mainly of regionals such as Suncorp, and Bendigo and Adelaide -- had an 11.2 per cent market share, 0.3 per cent below the 11.5 per cent share they recorded at the end of March.
CoreData principal Andrew Inwood said the regional banks, in particular, needed to reinvent themselves after recently trying to match big banks in cutting mortgage interest rates.
"Competing with CBA on price is like trying to compete with Walmart on price," he said. "The regionals should be focusing on their ability to take care of customers in a way with which the big two can't possibly compete."
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