[HN Gopher] Canadian man stuck in triangle of e-commerce fraud
___________________________________________________________________
Canadian man stuck in triangle of e-commerce fraud
Author : todsacerdoti
Score : 209 points
Date : 2024-01-19 15:37 UTC (7 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (krebsonsecurity.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (krebsonsecurity.com)
| whimsicalism wrote:
| > In Canada, a criminal record is not a record of conviction,
| it's a record of charges and that's why I can't work now," Barker
| said. "Potential employers never find out what the nature of it
| is, they just find out that I have a criminal arrest record."
|
| Funny, I usually associate Canada with good policymaking but this
| is substantially worse than the US.
| ttul wrote:
| What they're referring to is the court records that show
| whether someone was ever put through any kind of criminal
| justice process. If someone is arrested and charged, that
| record is publicly accessible to anyone for a few dollars. If
| the charges go nowhere, the record of the arrest and charge
| remains on the public record forever.
|
| It is indeed an unfair system.
| mapreduce wrote:
| It really is so unfair! Is it like this in other countries
| too? Like US, UK, Germany, etc.? I'd really like to know how
| this system works in other developed countries of the world.
| fnimick wrote:
| It is very much the same in the US. Some states and cities
| have implemented a so called "ban the box" law, but most of
| the country has not. I've filled out many background check,
| employment applications, rental application etc that will
| ask "have you ever been arrested or charged with a crime",
| and regardless of circumstance will deny you if you say
| yes. If you are found innocent, or charges dropped because
| they messed up the evidence etc, doesn't matter.
| leros wrote:
| In the US, as I understand it, you can go through a
| process (not free) to get your arrest record expunged and
| then you can legally answer no to that question. Still
| messed up but there is a path at least.
| marcosdumay wrote:
| Well, not a developed country, but in Brazil the government
| can only disclose convictions (outside of the government,
| internally there are a few exceptions), only to the person
| or a security-related organization, and it's illegal to
| even ask for a record in a work related process unless it's
| about one of those security-related organizations (the
| Federal Police maintains a list of them). Also, the data
| stays there starting at the conviction and only up to the
| point the person is found innocent in another ruling or the
| penalty ends.
|
| But the one things that keeps surprising me about the other
| countries isn't any of that discrimination against minor
| misbehaving. It is that justice promoters so often see
| their roles on society as harassing suspects until they
| break down. This seems to be the norm, and it's completely
| ridiculous.
| jyunwai wrote:
| I researched this, and I believe that both Barker's quote and
| this summary are not entirely correct. The reality in Canada
| is more nuanced.
|
| ---
|
| 1. Non-conviction records are not publicly available, and
| require the consent of the individual to be released.
|
| > If someone is arrested and charged, that record is publicly
| accessible to anyone for a few dollars. If the charges go
| nowhere, the record of the arrest and charge remains on the
| public record forever.
|
| Not exactly. The person under consideration must give their
| consent before the records are released.
|
| From the Alberta Civil Liberties Research Centre (ACLRC) [1]:
| "In Alberta, an individual's consent is required before
| police will perform a search of their police records for
| background check purposes. [...] Although it is common
| practice to provide the results only to the individual who
| requested the check, there is some variation depending on the
| police services. It may be released to an employer or
| volunteer agency when the individual requesting the check
| signs a consent form, or it is agreed to by both parties. No
| other outside party will receive any negative information
| about the individual."
|
| This is also backed up by a report from a Canadian Civil
| Liberties Association (CCLA) publication, distributed by
| Public Safety Canada (a department of the federal government)
| [1] (Page 23) [2]:
|
| "How does the Police Information Check process work? Most
| police services indicated that the Police Information Check
| process requires that the individual requesting the
| information attend a police station in person with
| identification and payment."
|
| ---
|
| 2. Barker's quote has inaccuracies, though there is a core of
| truth. Several different levels of criminal record checks
| exist, and not all levels include non-conviction records.
|
| > "In Canada, a criminal record is not a record of
| conviction, it's a record of charges and that's why I can't
| work now," Barker said. "Potential employers never find out
| what the nature of it is, they just find out that I have a
| criminal arrest record."
|
| While it's true that Barker said this, it looks like the
| reporter took his word without adding important nuance
| (though I appreciate Krebs on Security's work to bring
| attention to the issue, and the thoroughness of the
| description of the fraud).
|
| In reality, according to the ACLRC, employers who choose to
| request a background check must first request the candidate
| to submit a consent form to a police department, before the
| employer can access that person's records. So, the record is
| not publicly available to any person. (Anecdotally, this
| matches with my personal experiences applying for the most
| in-depth check--called the Vulnerable Sector Check, or VSC--
| in the past.)
|
| ---
|
| 3. The least in-depth record check would not include non-
| conviction records; the middle-depth record check may or may
| not include these records, depending on the judgement of the
| police department; and the most in-depth record check would
| always include these records.
|
| But this is where there is ambiguity about whether non-
| conviction records are included. While it might be expected
| that the Vulnerable Sector Check would include these charges
| as this check is the most in-depth, the ACLRC also identifies
| two lower levels of checks: the Criminal Record Check (CIC)
| and Police Information Check (PIC).
|
| According to the ACLRC, it looks like the CIC does not
| require a list of non-conviction records (aka charges without
| conviction), but a police department may reveal non-
| conviction records in certain cases for a PIC.
|
| From the ACLRC article: "The police will often disclose your
| non-conviction records in a PIC if they believe the
| information will help the potential employer or other agency
| in their decision-making process. This assumes that these
| agencies are qualified to make a determination that the
| information disclosed will determine the candidate's
| suitability or pose a safety risk.
|
| "It may lead to unfair stigmatization and result in the
| candidate being excluded from consideration for the position.
| As a result, the candidate may never know why they have been
| excluded from consideration, and thus are unable to respond.
| Although never convicted for a crime, the candidate will
| suffer an invisible form of punishment. The repercussions may
| reach beyond the denial of a position to a lingering loss of
| self-esteem, trust, and respect from the community."
|
| ---
|
| To summarize: while I completely sympathize with Barker and
| hope his situation can be quickly and justly resolved,
| Barker's quote is not completely incorrect, but it can be
| misleading.
|
| It's possible that more nuanced information from Barker was
| omitted from the final article, but in any case, a person's
| record of charges that did not lead to a conviction is not
| publicly available. Instead, access to these records requires
| an individual to submit a consent form to a police
| department.
|
| Furthermore, not all potential workplaces require a the type
| of background check that would reveal these non-conviction
| records. Some workplaces would require a Criminal Record
| Check (CIC), which would not include these records. Others,
| however, would require a Police Information Check (PIC),
| which may or may not include these records, depending on the
| police department's response.
|
| I want to re-emphasize that Barker's situation is unjust, and
| clearly puts him in a difficult situation in life. But it is
| in the reader's interest to know the Canada's legal situation
| in reality includes important nuances that differ from the
| account provided in the article.
|
| ---
|
| Sources:
|
| [1] https://www.aclrc.com/disclosure-of-non-conviction-
| records
|
| [2] https://www.publicsafety.gc.ca/lbrr/archives/cnmcs-
| plcng/cn3...
|
| ---
|
| If any person with legal expertise is reading this, as my
| commentary is based on personal research without relevant
| legal training, please feel free to add your perspective.
| belval wrote:
| > a person's record of charges that did not lead to a
| conviction is not publicly available, but rather requires
| an individual's consent.
|
| Unless I misunderstood isn't that almost the exact same
| thing though? When getting hired they will ask you to fill
| out some forms prior to your background check that
| explicitly give the permission to run a background check. I
| never tried to refuse but I doubt it would be welcomed.
| jyunwai wrote:
| It's still a problem for Barker, and I don't want at all
| to discount that his situation is unjust. However, the
| non-conviction records will not necessarily show up on
| his report. If the employer requests the base level of a
| background check, the records will not show up. If the
| employer instead requests a more in-depth check (a PIC),
| the records may or may not show up.
|
| Not all employers would request the more in-depth check.
| Barker is therefore not at a disadvantage for all jobs
| for a non-convicted charge, but it is completely unjust
| that he can potentially be at a disadvantage for a fair
| number of jobs.
|
| Barker deserves recourse and more awareness of his case.
| But at the same time, the potential impression that any
| Canadian resident that is charged-but-not-convicted will
| have a publicly-available record that bars them from
| work, is not a correct one.
| mcv wrote:
| Requiring consent doesn't make a difference when it's about
| employment. If you don't give consent, you don't get the
| job.
| jyunwai wrote:
| It's true that Barker is now disadvantaged for certain
| types of jobs for an accusation he was never convicted
| of, which is completely unjust. He deserves far better
| treatment.
|
| However, requiring consent means that the records are not
| publicly available, so he is not immediately disqualified
| when he applies. In addition, a company has to
| specifically request for a deeper background check for
| this to appear--the base level of a background check only
| includes convictions. No person in Canada who is charged
| yet not convicted is therefore barred from work, which is
| an impression made from Barker's quote and a previous
| comment.
|
| A more precise understanding of the system is important
| for advocacy to change it. It's more effective to argue
| for reforms related to Police Information Checks (such as
| for more transparency) to be specific, and this requires
| a specific awareness of how Canada's process for
| background checks works.
| j45 wrote:
| This is pretty defensive and confusing. Maybe police
| information checks are a revenue stream.
|
| Consent to get someone's record is being conflated with
| what is on someone's record being wrong, or only a charge.
|
| It's a bit of a moot point where consent is involved when
| the content of a charge has the same impact on not getting
| employment.
| jyunwai wrote:
| To make this clearer, the comment I was replying to says,
| "If someone is arrested and charged, that record is
| publicly accessible to anyone for a few dollars. If the
| charges go nowhere, the record of the arrest and charge
| remains on the public record forever." But neither
| statement is true upon a search.
|
| Separately, Barker's quote in the article asserts that in
| Canada, there is a single criminal record check available
| for a person, and that "is not a record of conviction,
| it's a record of charges." The reality is that there are
| several types of background checks, and the base level
| lists a record of convictions while omitting charges--
| though in any case, Barker is clearly an innocent person
| who should have the incident dropped from a check at any
| level.
| papercrane wrote:
| > If the charges go nowhere, the record of the arrest and
| charge remains on the public record forever.
|
| This isn't necessarily true. It's dumb that it's not
| automatic, but you can request in the destruction of non-
| conviction information.
| pi-e-sigma wrote:
| And they can deny the destruction of that non-conviction
| information without having to explain why.
| https://www.rcmp-grc.gc.ca/en/managing-criminal-record
| belval wrote:
| > Canada
|
| > good policymaking
|
| As a Canadian, seems like we just have good PR.
| unsupp0rted wrote:
| Canada has INCREDIBLE international PR. Perhaps better than
| any other OECD country, compared to its reality.
| rootusrootus wrote:
| You look almost European in design and you're in close
| proximity to a country everyone loves to hate. You absolutely
| glow by comparison.
|
| I gotta say, though, that every time I go up to Canada I'm
| struck by how much everything seems just like the US. If the
| US ever gets universal healthcare it'll be especially hard to
| tell the difference. Hell, we're even well on our way to
| having our own king!
| fnimick wrote:
| It absolutely works that way in the US. Lots of jobs, financial
| applications, housing rental applications etc ask if you have
| ever been _charged_ with a crime - not convicted, only charged
| - and even if you are found innocent, or the charges dropped
| because it turns out their initial investigation was wrong etc
| - it closes most doors for you.
| whimsicalism wrote:
| Probably state dependent, do not think they can do that where
| I live.
| fnimick wrote:
| It is state and municipality dependent.
| https://www.paycor.com/resource-center/articles/ban-the-
| box-...
| whimsicalism wrote:
| fwiw that map covers a significant majority of Americans
| in states with some box restriction
| fnimick wrote:
| The map itself is wildly misleading. New York is colored
| in the map, for example, because four cities in the state
| have some sort of restriction on it (some only for
| government employees, too, so private companies can ask
| whatever they want)
| noah_buddy wrote:
| I think that Canada is absolutely undeserving of this record
| and there have been a few recent stories that illustrate
| governmental ineptitude or even malice.
|
| This is the one that springs to mind:
|
| https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-65107912.amp
| whimsicalism wrote:
| Eh, I dont find these in-hindsight "reports" that compelling.
| The implication that if someone beats their wife we should be
| abke to stop them from committing a mass shooting seems
| incorrect.
| noah_buddy wrote:
| I think clearly a major failing to not immediately announce
| to the public that a mass shooter is driving a replica
| police car. That's beyond even the other details that
| didn't clue the government off that he was up to no good
| (like withdrawing half a million in cash from a bank
| account).
| lbhdc wrote:
| I used to work in heavy industry and did a lot of work in
| Canada (I am an American).
|
| Canada always had the worst security to go through because the
| same thing this guy is experiencing everyone crossing the
| boarder for work got the same thing from boarder security.
|
| Anyone who had been arrested would get held at customs for a
| few hours, and occasionally over night. Basically you would get
| interrogated by a boarder guard, and the boarder guards would
| complain that they don't convict people of crimes in the US
| while asking about 20 year old arrest records.
|
| I kind of assumed they were just terrible to foreigners coming
| in, but to do it to their own citizens is pretty awful.
| dghlsakjg wrote:
| If you think Canadian border guards are bad, its because
| you've never seen how American border guards treat non-
| citizens.
|
| If you tried to enter the US with a criminal record, there is
| a VERY good chance that you would not be allowed in, and
| would be handed a 5-10 year ban.
|
| Most countries do not allow visa-less entry to convicted
| criminals. The fact that Canada let your co-workers in at all
| is at the discretion of the border guard.
|
| Canada is very clear about the steps that those with a
| criminal record need to go through prior to applying for
| entry at the border. It sounds like your coworkers showed up
| to the border without the necessary preparation and were
| allowed to enter at the officer's kindness/discretion in
| spite of their criminal pasts and lack of documentation.
|
| https://www.canada.ca/en/immigration-refugees-
| citizenship/se...
| lbhdc wrote:
| I had to shepard many South Americans and Europeans through
| American boarder security for this same job.
|
| I found Canadas process to be much more restrictive. They
| similarly handed out decade+ bans.
|
| We had a legal team prepping the paperwork for these trips,
| they had the correct paperwork.
| dghlsakjg wrote:
| Did the people entering the US from Europe/South America
| have criminal records?
|
| Part of the reason that it is harder for an American with
| a criminal record entering Canada is the fact that it is
| visa free. A convicted American at the Canadian border
| has likely not gone back and forth with immigration
| authorities, or had an interview at the embassy like a
| South American at the US border would.
|
| By the time a European or South American arrives at the
| border they have already submitted the paperwork to an
| embassy (or received an ESTA/visa waiver), and have been
| given permission. Without convincing proof that they are
| eligible to enter the USA, the airline won't even let
| them on the plane.
|
| The reality is that it is perfectly reasonable for a
| country to deny entry or investigate a convicted criminal
| before granting the privilege of entering the country.
| Doubly so when the purpose of entry is for work.
|
| As a non convict, I had to prove to Canada that I could
| support myself and would not be a burden on the medical
| or other social systems in addition to an FBI background
| check, and a variety of other paperwork before I was
| granted residency. It took upwards of a year for all
| that.
|
| By what reasoning should Canada prioritize or not
| investigate people that have, in the past, been a burden
| or danger to their society. Entry by non permanent
| residents or citizens is a privilege, and I think it is
| perfectly reasonable for a country to ensure that a
| convicted criminal won't pose a danger or burden.
| lbhdc wrote:
| Everyone had to pass a security clearance that prevented
| them from accepting people with criminal convictions, but
| prior arrests with no-convictions were fine.
|
| Our work required Canadian work visas for us to operate
| in Canada, and everyone had the correct passport stamps
| before ever leaving (this again was handled by the legal
| team).
|
| We were getting hassled over the arrests without
| convictions (this was only air travel, we never drove).
|
| I am fine with countries doing whatever the need to. I
| think citizens getting subjected to similar treatment
| (tfa) pretty unreasonable.
| dghlsakjg wrote:
| Gotcha. I imagined you were driving a busload of
| roughnecks with convictions to the oil fields.
|
| It is absolutely BS that an arrest with no conviction
| would lead to delays at the border.
| whimsicalism wrote:
| The reality is that if you expect immigration trouble, you
| should always enter through an airport and never a border
| crossing.
| beaeglebeached wrote:
| I was on some kind of watchlist for awhile ( fought in
| foreign militia ) and you get the extremes at the land
| border. Most times things are much better. But when
| they're worse, it's WAY worse.
|
| (Although to be fair at airport was only place CBP told
| me they'd deny entry to the country to me US passport
| holder)
| beaeglebeached wrote:
| Outside of five eyes most countries don't know dick about
| your record, and usually don't even ask. Our neighbor
| Mexico often doesn't even look at your ID.
|
| US and Canada share immigration info, so they have unusual
| overlap.
| newsclues wrote:
| Canada has terrible policy making.
| dghlsakjg wrote:
| This information seems to be incorrect based on this
| https://stepstojustice.ca/questions/employment-and-work/can-...
|
| and this
|
| https://certn.co/blog/criminal-record-check-alberta-your-faq...
|
| It seems like employers can only factor convictions, and they
| must justify why that conviction would be a factor in doing the
| job.
|
| What I can believe is that the RCMP would botch a case
| involving a native person.
|
| Just yesterday a bunch of video transcriptions were released of
| RCMP officers busting up a peaceful protest by native tribes.
| https://www.cbc.ca/news/indigenous/rcmp-audio-wetsuweten-coa...
|
| The officers referred to tribal members with face-paint
| honoring missing and murdered women as "orcs".
|
| In regards to arresting a mentally disabled man: "That big f--
| king ogre looking dude that is in those videos he is actually
| like autistic, then the f--king guys just beat the shit out of
| him and then he started crying. I felt bad for him, apparently
| the sergeant grabbed his balls and twisted, I guess. He was on
| the ground and everyone was just grabbing limbs. He didn't have
| a limb to grab so he just like grabs his balls like 'You done
| now? You done resisting?"
|
| Canada has decent policy, but we have, for some reason,
| imported policing culture from the states.
| _rm wrote:
| Just based on reading the first link you posted, what you've
| said is incorrect, as it says they can ask for a "Criminal
| record and judicial matters check" which includes charges.
|
| If that's the case, "they can't" reject you just based on
| charges really means "they can as long as they don't say they
| did".
| dghlsakjg wrote:
| In my experience in working in Canada the records check is
| done after an offer is extended since it is not free,
| requires the consent of the person being checked, and takes
| several days at best, so it would be very obvious why the
| offer was retracted.
|
| I haven't said anything incorrect. I said that employers
| can only factor convictions, not that they can't get access
| to other records.
| bparsons wrote:
| He is likely referring to a "vulnerable sector check". This
| is a special type of background check for people that
| interact with children, the disabled or seniors etc. This
| type of background check includes stuff like expunged
| convictions, or charges where prosecutions were not pursued.
|
| It can be a useful tool, but it obviously needs to account
| for instances such as this.
| fnimick wrote:
| I'm not sure (EDIT: replaced 'it is' with 'it should be') a
| useful tool when taking non-convictions into account. If
| person A was arrested and then charges were dropped, does
| that make them less innocent than person B who was never
| arrested in the first place?
|
| You could argue that from a probabilistic view, any person
| who is arrested for a crime is more likely to be a criminal
| than one who is never arrested ever - and it's up to us as
| a society whether we want to expose that information so
| that people can avoid hiring those who have ever been
| arrested.
| jstarfish wrote:
| > You could argue that from a probabilistic view, any
| person who is arrested for a crime is more likely to be a
| criminal than one who is never arrested ever - and it's
| up to us as a society whether we want to expose that
| information so that people can avoid hiring those who
| have ever been arrested.
|
| Radical feminism really fucked society with this logic
| since it resonates with hysterics and fools. Previously,
| it was how everyone blames all crime in town on the Bad
| Kid because he was caught stealing that one time.
|
| "He clearly has it in him to do it!" they say. _We all
| do,_ I say. Criminals aren 't Morlocks from the fucking
| moon, they're _people just like you_ who were unlucky
| /incompetent enough to get caught.
|
| Arrests/accusations are cheap. Convictions require
| vetting and evidence. Weighing both the same is a social
| travesty that defeats the purpose of the justice system
| and opens everybody up to being framed for anything.
|
| If you dare to know how dangerously you live, read up on
| domestic violence laws and see how many you break when
| arguing with your spouse. It takes very little to get
| yourself arrested.
| dghlsakjg wrote:
| You could also argue that someone who was arrested, but
| never convicted, is even less likely to be a criminal.
|
| After all, the not inconsiderable resources of the state
| were focused specifically on that person and their
| behavior, and the state determined that there wasn't
| enough evidence to even proceed with charges.
|
| A person who has never been arrested has likely never had
| someone who is deeply incentivized to find wrongdoing
| look into their actions. It would seem that, logically,
| we should look most suspiciously at those who have never
| been arrested!
|
| This is of course a naive view of the justice system. We
| should perhaps treat an arrest as nothing at all since we
| know that plenty of innocent people get arrested, and the
| noble thing to do is presume innocence absence a
| conviction instead of presuming guilt on a weak signal.
| jyunwai wrote:
| I found that Canada has three types of background checks:
| the Vulnerable Sector Check (VSC) as you mentioned, the
| Police Information Check (PIC), and the Criminal Record
| Check (CIC).
|
| The VSC always includes non-conviction records. The CIC
| omits these types of records, as this only reports
| convictions. However, the middle-level PIC can include
| these records on a case-by-case basis. The Alberta Civil
| Liberties Research Centre reports [1]: "The police will
| often disclose your non-conviction records in a PIC if they
| believe the information will help the potential employer or
| other agency in their decision-making process. This assumes
| that these agencies are qualified to make a determination
| that the information disclosed will determine the
| candidate's suitability or pose a safety risk."
|
| The circumstances are especially unfair to Barker as he has
| been working for Duncan First Nation in a role that
| requires involvement in finance. So, Barker may be
| especially affected by the non-conviction record even for
| jobs related to managing finances that don't require a VSC,
| but also a PIC, as a police department would likely find
| the record relevant for any position related to finances.
|
| [1] https://www.aclrc.com/disclosure-of-non-conviction-
| records
| sandworm101 wrote:
| >> Funny, I usually associate Canada with good policymaking but
| this is substantially worse than the US.
|
| Generally yes, but this is a specific law enforcement problem
| tied to Canada's unique police culture. Specifically, the way
| the RCMP hire and promote police officers has direct negative
| implications on "white collar" investigations in Canada.
|
| Without explaining all the details, the RCMP is effectively
| Canada's national police force but is also the local police
| force for most communities. Imagine it as if the FBI also did
| speeding tickets. All new cops start out doing something like
| traffic enforcement, often in small/northern communities well
| away from their homes. Only after years of "general duty" (aka
| traffic) can they move up to things like "electronic crime".
| Many good people are lost through this process. The average
| compsci or finance grad isn't going to want to spend years
| handing out speeding tickets before doing what they are
| actually trained to do. And the people who rise to the top of
| general street policing are often not the best people for long-
| term white collar investigations.
|
| https://www.rcmp-grc.gc.ca/en/police-officer-careers
|
| "The RCMP is a national organization with diverse career
| opportunities like no other police service. Applicants may be
| asked to _relocate anywhere within Canada_ where there is need
| of your services. "
|
| "You may choose to continue in general duty policing, or you
| may have the desire and opportunity to train for and transfer
| to more specialized areas of policing."
|
| Want to investigate online fraud? Have a forensics or
| criminology degree? Ready to chase down people doing horrible
| things online? Well, here is your radar gun and ticket to the
| Yukon territory. Remember to bring a coat. Call us back in a
| few years and we _may_ have something for you.
| BobaFloutist wrote:
| Wow that sounds almost as bad as how we select our cops in
| the US. Almost.
| rolph wrote:
| in the US as long as its not too bad [misdemenor] and you
| behave yourself, it goes away [depending on state].
|
| in canada you are the sum total of every mistake you have made
| in your life, for your entire life.
| ttul wrote:
| Frankly, this is yet another article justifying why you must
| never speak to the police.
| dmoy wrote:
| (the canonical talk on that topic:
| https://youtu.be/d-7o9xYp7eE?feature=shared)
| bigbabybuckman wrote:
| Happy STFU Friday! https://www.youtube.com/shorts/kEeId0EG-XE
| tamimio wrote:
| Does that even work in Canada? The article is about a
| Canadian issue.
| cldellow wrote:
| If you invoked the fifth, you'd be made fun of, since
| that's a US thing.
|
| But section 7 of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms:
|
| > Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of
| the person and the right not to be deprived thereof
| except in accordance with the principles of fundamental
| justice.
|
| has been found to provide similar protections. You can be
| required to identify yourself, and, in drunk driving
| cases, you can be required to do roadside sobriety tests,
| but in general, you aren't obliged to answer questions
| from the police.
| oh_sigh wrote:
| What part of him talking to the police worsened his situation?
| TinyRick wrote:
| My interpretation is that he provided enough evidence to the
| RCMP that convinced them to stay the case, since they likely
| thought the evidence they had to convict Barker was weak.
| This lead to him not having a chance in court to clear his
| name.
|
| Had he not spoken to the police at all, and instead waited to
| present his evidence in court, he likely would have been
| found not guilty and therefore would have cleared his name.
|
| Him talking to police worsened the situation because they are
| not the ones who evaluate the evidence and make a conviction
| decision (judges/juries do that). The job of the police is to
| collect evidence, and Barker did that for them (to his
| detriment).
| unsupp0rted wrote:
| Being out of town in Halifax for the following 3 days
| probably made the officer a lot less convinced of innocence
| right off the bat. That's why he showed up at the house the
| next day.
| mindslight wrote:
| So much just-world-fallacy-inspired victim blaming in this
| thread. The problem here is actually better described as a
| breakdown in communication with the police, on the part of
| the RCMP. (I wonder if they have their own videos like " _Don
| 't listen to your victims_" and " _Shut your eyes Mondays_ "
| ?)
|
| Modulo the third party scammer that created the situation,
| the bad actor here is the RCMP itself for bringing the weight
| of the government down on this guy without doing the real
| work of actually investigating. The true reform would be to
| destroy this regressive idea whereby government
| agents/systems can attack people and then just walk away from
| the matter after realizing they are wrong. If there were
| statutory reimbursements for hiring legal representation,
| time spent/detained, emotional distress etc, then the victim
| here would have the resources to continue the matter in the
| eventually consistent justice system. Instead the official
| policy would seem to be something like "Thank you for your
| involuntary contribution to this rookie agent's training.
| Better luck next time"
| lopkeny12ko wrote:
| This is an important lesson in data and operational security.
| Don't use your credit card on websites you don't trust, and use
| virtual cards whenever possible. And 2FA all your online
| accounts. A few easy steps could have avoided a massive headache.
| rohansingh wrote:
| If the man is taken at his word, his only error was buying from
| a seller on Amazon.ca. What credit card he used there didn't
| matter at all.
| leros wrote:
| Unfortunately in this case, the guy getting punished didn't do
| anything wrong. It's the woman who's Walmart account was hacked
| who messed up.
| rootusrootus wrote:
| Even then, I'd put at least some blame on Walmart. Adding a
| new shipping address to an existing e-commerce account is an
| obvious situation where a little extra scrutiny is warranted.
| At least a 2FA check.
| bayuah wrote:
| I agree. In my country, many e-commerce platforms require
| to add of a phone number. Therefore, if you add an address,
| you must input the code sent to your phone. Another point
| to note is that, for additional security, some e-commerce
| platforms even put your account on hold for a few days if
| you change the aforementioned phone number.
| TheCleric wrote:
| Even Amazon in the past has at least asked me to reenter
| the card's CVV when attempting to add a new address.
| function_seven wrote:
| How would this prevent what happened to Timothy Barker?
| stanmancan wrote:
| The two websites in question were Amazon and Walmart. If you
| can't trust either of those then who can you trust?
| nytesky wrote:
| Technically it was a 3rd party seller right? Like eBay or a
| flea market or the back of a truck?
| organsnyder wrote:
| Technically, yes. But Amazon's site doesn't make this
| clear.
| toast0 wrote:
| Yes, but you still pay Amazon, and Amazon pays the seller.
| Using a virtual card wouldn't have helped him here. The
| other victim wouldn't have been helped by using a virtual
| card at Walmart.ca either.
| nytesky wrote:
| A virtual card that expires or is limited would have
| protected somewhat.
| oh_sigh wrote:
| No, because the order would still have gone on
| Walmart.com with his real name and address
| interestica wrote:
| There are no virtual card options
| bsder wrote:
| How about we simply make _credit card companies_ liable for all
| of these kinds of frauds? Not the merchant, not the consumer,
| not the marketplace--the credit card company.
|
| If we did that, suddenly all the banks, marketplaces, etc.
| would have all the nice security things we've been bitching
| about for years.
| razakel wrote:
| They are, that's part of the point of having a credit card -
| you're spending the bank's money, not yours, and they have
| better lawyers.
| bayuah wrote:
| Well, that is why I totally prefer debit card. Credit card
| basically you just borrowing money from bank for your
| (usually daily and small) purchases.
| TheCleric wrote:
| Not in my experience. It appears that way to the CC user,
| but usually comes back to the merchant as a chargeback.
| mcv wrote:
| Every time credit cards come up, everybody always tells me
| that this is their big advantage: that it's trivial to revert
| these two payments.
|
| So this fraud shouldn't work, and yet it does. How is that
| possible?
| belval wrote:
| > Don't use your credit card on websites you don't trust
|
| The person in this article bought stuff from Amazon with their
| credit card and did not have their account compromised. Unless
| you are arguing against buying stuff on the Internet in general
| I don't see how you comment has anything to do with the case at
| hand.
|
| This is mostly typical RCMP overreach and the person should
| seek legal advice on counter-suing for damages.
| leereeves wrote:
| >> Don't use your credit card on websites you don't trust
|
| > The person in this article bought stuff from Amazon
|
| Yeah, you shouldn't trust Amazon. They don't do nearly enough
| to ensure their 3rd party marketplace is safe.
| mcv wrote:
| Amazon is one of the largest companies in world. They have
| a responsibility to be more trustworthy than this, and
| should be held accountable.
| leereeves wrote:
| I agree, and I didn't mean to blame the victim here (in
| case it sounded like that to anyone).
|
| But it is a lesson to the rest of us, about the risk of
| shopping on Amazon.
| mcv wrote:
| I totally agree, and I don't buy from Amazon as a matter
| of principle, but considering their size, clearly most
| people don't. And I suspect that's not because they're
| fine with the risk, but because they're not aware of it.
| And that's a problem. Amazon is profiting from trust that
| they're not worthy of.
| keithweaver wrote:
| I completely agree about using Virtual Credit Cards generally.
| However, the majority of Canadian Banks (Especially the Big 6)
| don't offer virtual credit cards. Even US banks that offer
| credit cards in Canada don't offer it in here, but they do it
| the US (Ex. Capital One).
| organsnyder wrote:
| And don't buy anything from Amazon (at the very least only from
| sellers that use Amazon's fulfillment services, which is easy
| to gloss over).
| croes wrote:
| They claim he used the woman's card, so no that wouldn't have
| helped
| UseStrict wrote:
| Sounds about right, the RCMP has a long history of First Nations
| neglect. This seems like it would be a straightforward case to
| prove his innocence. Also a good reminder of why it's important
| to never speak with police without a lawyer.
| naasking wrote:
| Except we don't have the same rights to a lawyer as in the US.
| We have a right to _speak_ to a lawyer, but that could be over
| the phone and they are not present during questioning:
|
| https://blogs.ubc.ca/ijhr/2021/11/29/the-right-to-counsel-it...
| Spoom wrote:
| It also sounds like the RCMP will never take the case to
| trial (based on the article, they may know that this is
| actually triangulation fraud) and as such, he'll never have a
| chance to either defend himself or expunge his record.
| papercrane wrote:
| If charges are withdrawn or dismissed, as long as you don't
| have any convictions on record and there isn't a public
| safety concern you can request the destruction of non-
| conviction information from your record.
|
| It's silly that you need to request it, but there is a
| process to expunge your record.
| whimsicalism wrote:
| I think part of the issue here is the subtle distinction
| between stayed and withdrawn.
| deno wrote:
| It seems the charges expire after a year.
|
| As per https://laws-
| lois.justice.gc.ca/eng/acts/c-46/page-98.html#d...:
|
| (4) However, if the Attorney General or counsel does not
| give notice under subsection (3) on or before the first
| anniversary of the day on which the stay of proceedings
| was entered, the proceedings are deemed never to have
| been commenced.
| Scoundreller wrote:
| > We have a right to speak to a lawyer, but that could be
| over the phone and they are not present during questioning
|
| You can refuse to answer most questions during questioning,
| but even if you yell "lawyer!!!" A million times and spill
| the beans after the millionth repeat question, you're
| screwed.
|
| Then there's the constitution "protections" about illegally
| gained evidence where the judge can say "yeah, it was
| unconstitutional but I'll allow it anyway"
| wredue wrote:
| I don't know why Canada gets so many weird AF legal claims on
| HN and Reddit (in particular that we supposedly don't have
| the right to self defence), but we do, in fact, have the
| right to remain silent and to not be compelled to testify
| against oneself.
|
| There are circumstances where you can be interviewed without
| a lawyer present, but you cannot be compelled to answer those
| questions, and you can still consult a lawyer for all
| interview questions.
| twisteriffic wrote:
| There's a huge cottage industry of YouTube rage farmers who
| spread that kind of misinformation for clicks. It's
| particularly popular in the prairies right now.
| naasking wrote:
| I'm not sure if you're claiming that what I wrote is
| "weird", but nothing I said was incorrect and the link I
| provided provides extensive information on case law here.
| Suffice it to say, most people have a very hard time
| refusing to answer while being grilled for hours, and the
| article cites numerous such examples.
|
| > and you can still consult a lawyer for all interview
| questions.
|
| This is simply not as straightforward as you're implying.
| Per the article, R v Sinclair established that in most
| cases, a detainee may be permitted to consult a lawyer only
| once.
| smcin wrote:
| _R v Sinclair (2010 SCC 35) is a leading case from the
| Supreme Court of Canada on a detainee 's right to counsel
| under section 10(b) of the Canadian Charter of Rights and
| Freedoms.
|
| Specifically, the case addresses two issues regarding the
| police's implementation duty under the right to counsel:
| 1) does a detainee have the right to have a lawyer
| present during police questioning, and 2) does a detainee
| have the right to make multiple phone calls to their
| lawyer. A majority of the Court answered the first
| question in the negative, and answered the second
| question in the negative, subject to a change of
| circumstances._
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R_v_Sinclair
| mthoms wrote:
| You seem to be in agreement. Perhaps you responded to the
| wrong person? That's the same case law the parent cited
| (albeit indirectly - see their link up thread).
| chromatin wrote:
| Unfortunately, Canada does not have the same legal protections
| (both in written law [i.e., the Bill of Rights] and in
| jurisprudence) as in the United States.
| beached_whale wrote:
| What rights in the US would have helped here the Canadian
| Charter of Rights and Freedoms doesn't already do. Section 9
| and 10 seem to cover this well
| adamwk wrote:
| Well going off the article he'd at least not have a
| criminal record
| mthoms wrote:
| He doesn't have a criminal record though. He has an
| arrest record.
|
| Granted the way the article explained it is pretty poor.
| I'm not totally clear what it was trying to say in that
| regard.
|
| As an aside, Canada has a robust pardon system[0] that
| the US doesn't have. At least aside from the truly
| bizarre (at least to me) system of presidential pardons.
|
| A pardon wipes your record of the specific crime
| completely FWIW.
|
| [0] https://www.pardons.org/pardons/faqs/
| jackconsidine wrote:
| I will have to write a case study on this at some point, but
| triangle fraudsters have attempted to use our company's delivery
| service [0] to fulfill curbside pickups from Best Buy etc
| presumably to unsuspecting e-commerce buyers. I noticed certain a
| subset of users frequently changing their card, and the name on
| their delivery, and figured out what they were doing.
|
| We stopped a few dozen attempts, filing police reports and
| contacting the people with names matching the cards. We now use
| Stripe Verify to ensure identity matches, which I really would
| have preferred not to do as a privacy-oriented person.
|
| Interestingly, the police usually didn't want to deal with these
| things, even if the merchandise was in their jurisdiction
| ctrlaltdylan wrote:
| We provide ID verification specifically for eCommerce to help
| prevent chargeback fraud: https://getverdict.com
|
| This is the first where I've heard of using IDv for preventing
| triangle fraud on the fulfillment side.
|
| Just curious - how does this fraud harm you the delivery
| service? The chargeback hits the merchant only no? Or are you
| the merchant in this transaction as well?
| jackconsidine wrote:
| Similar to you, chargeback is a concern (triangle fraudsters
| using stolen credit cards and all). We're not the merchant,
| normally that's a brick and mortar retailer. In addition to
| chargeback Generally, I really hate the idea of seedy users
| exploiting the service and feel obligated to root that out.
| naitgacem wrote:
| where I'm from, it's insanely common to buy a smartphone, only to
| find out when you put your sim card in, that it was stolen.
|
| The authorities will just take it back (with no refund ofc) if
| you can _prove_ that you bought it.
|
| However, most purchases are from online sellers, or stores that
| say (this phone came from abroad by an immigrant).
|
| Now this is indeed how most electronics enter the country, so the
| risk is unavoidable sadly.
| 8organicbits wrote:
| Couldn't the seller put in a sim card to determine if the phone
| was stolen?
| ivalm wrote:
| Why would they? The seller wants to move product and illegal
| product comes with discount.
| mcv wrote:
| Doesn't that make them guilty of fencing?
|
| Do they at least refund the illegal purchase?
| whimsicalism wrote:
| You are reasoning from high rule of law when OP is
| clearly describing a low rule of law country, prolly
| middle-income.
| naitgacem wrote:
| unfortunately it's much more insidious, they are both
| priced exactly the same. no one's the wiser until the
| police hit you up, or you try to fly abroad.
| whimsicalism wrote:
| It is too bad that the woman who was victimized appears too dumb
| to understand what triangulation fraud is and seems convinced
| that Barker is the perpetrator.
| Fripplebubby wrote:
| Does it have any bearing on the case, though? I agree but it
| may make no difference
| krunck wrote:
| Can't rule out racism here. On the part of the woman and the
| RCMP.
| whimsicalism wrote:
| Certainly on the part of RCMP, you can tell when you are
| reading a case where the cops are dealing with a community
| they do not expect to advocate for themselves.
| unsupp0rted wrote:
| Needn't rule in racism, so I don't.
| mcv wrote:
| You can't blame this on the other victim. The problem is that
| the RCMP has no clue what they're doing, and that Amazon is
| enabling this fraud.
| whimsicalism wrote:
| Was not saying this was the issue at hand, I just am
| surprised the woman quoted is so dense.
| randerson wrote:
| Sounds like the Ontario woman was likely reusing a password and
| had her account taken over. Walmart should help this guy out by
| running password dumps against her account to see if that's the
| case.
| actionfromafar wrote:
| Walmart... helping?
| qingcharles wrote:
| I don't know Canadian law. Once a prosecution is started, must it
| be completed within the statute of limitations for that crime?
|
| I think that's how it generally works in the USA. Because the
| prosecution is stayed you lose the right to a speedy trial, but
| the statute of limitations still ticks.
| OsrsNeedsf2P wrote:
| There is no statue of limitations in Canadian law.
| andrewla wrote:
| There is no statute of limitations, generally, but Canada
| does recognize the right to a speedy trial. The Charter of
| Rights And Freedoms [1] 11b says "Any person charged with an
| offence has the right ... to be tried within a reasonable
| time".
|
| Common law interpretation through R. v. Jordan [2]
| establishes a presumptive ceiling on the time between charges
| and trial, "18 months for cases tried in the provincial
| court, and 30 months for cases in the superior court".
|
| In the US statutes of limitations vary between jurisdictions
| and offenses; some start the clock ticking at the commission
| of the criminal act, others at when it comes to light, and
| others when it is reported to law enforcement. This is in
| addition to the right to a speedy trial, but the US does not
| have any uniform guidance on what "speedy" means and
| generally courts do not entertain speedy trial motions.
|
| [1] https://laws-lois.justice.gc.ca/eng/const/page-12.html
|
| [2] https://scc-csc.lexum.com/scc-csc/scc-
| csc/en/item/16057/inde...
| retrac wrote:
| Specifically, there is no statute of limitations for
| indictable criminal offences, the equivalent of a felony.
| Minor offences have a limit of one year. Civil matters have a
| limit in many provinces, too.
| mapreduce wrote:
| Slightly tangential question but why is credit card security so
| weak in the first place? I mean all we need is 16 digits of card
| number, 4 digits of expiry date and 3 digits of CVV. The 23
| digits can leak from so many places.
|
| In this day why don't the credit card payment systems require
| multi-factor authentication for online payments? Why don't
| payment machines challenge you for PIN for payments?
| Gare wrote:
| Simple: because it adds friction, and the optional amount of
| fraud is not zero.
|
| https://www.bitsaboutmoney.com/archive/optimal-amount-of-fra...
| mcv wrote:
| Every time this comes up, people claim that this lack of
| security doesn't matter because it's easy to reverse these
| payments. But if that's true, then why is the woman so upset
| and why is Barker handled so aggressively? It should be easy to
| revert both payments.
| rootusrootus wrote:
| This case is probably not a great example to use, because the
| woman's card wasn't stolen. Her account at Walmart was
| hacked, and the purchase was made there with the shipment
| sent to a different address.
| mcv wrote:
| Why would that not make it a good example? It's still a
| case of fraud, enabled by the lack of security on credit
| card payments. The payment hadn't been authorised by the
| woman.
| JaggedJax wrote:
| This looks like an easy thing for Walmart to prevent if
| they bothered. On Amazon if you add a new shipping address,
| you can't ship to it until you re-verify your credit card
| CVV. With just that simple check this attack would be
| blocked (unless they steal the entire CC info of course).
| everybodyknows wrote:
| That's a question for Amazon, which makes the whole thing
| possible by:
|
| 1. Lulling naive or hurried customers who like to think
| they're buying "from Amazon" into buying from fraudsters, and
|
| 2. Paying the fraudsters so quickly that the seller's account
| is closed before action is taken the fraud, and
|
| 3. Vetting sellers so promiscuously that the individual
| fraudster's cycle can continue.
|
| In this light, Krebs diagram is deficient, because it omits
| Amazon from the loop. It's not "triangulation", the more
| accurate word would be _quadrilateralization_ -- but spell-
| check says that 's not a word.
| rootusrootus wrote:
| Nit: you also need the five digit zip code
| BobaFloutist wrote:
| That's the idea with the expiry date, and the CVV, and the zip
| code. The problem is, it doesn't seem possible to convince
| businesses not to hold on to whatever security info is required
| to charge the card in plain text, so whatever the relevant
| details are inevitably get leaked from some hotel or eCommerce
| giant that really shouldn't have them in the first place, but
| hasn't set up a way to securely verify credentials with the
| bank without literally recording them.
|
| You can keep adding on additional pieces of bullshit
| information customers need to remember all you want, none of it
| will matter as long as banks and credit card companies don't
| force businesses to treat them as actually sensitive
| information.
| mainde wrote:
| I think that enforcing what you're suggesting is incredibly
| hard and I don't think can scale, it's what PCI-DSS and
| similar are meant to tackle, it really doesn't work in my
| experience.
|
| This is a protocol/product problem, it's wild that to make a
| payment all the crown jewels need to be put on the wire. It's
| about time that payment devices and the whole ecosystem
| adopts some sensible cryptography that, at minimum allows
| signing payment requests, and ideally keeps its keys private.
|
| Although this whole problem is kind of already solved by
| 3DS2, albeit not in a great way.
| markus92 wrote:
| In the EU it's not uncommon to have some 2FA. My bank asks me
| to confirm online CC purchases all the time on their app with
| 3D secure.
| mattw2121 wrote:
| This is not me blaming the victim. He totally shouldn't have to
| worry about what I am about to say. If he was ordering for
| himself, my advice wouldn't apply.
|
| If you are ordering something for your work, use a work credit
| card and have it delivered to your work address. I never put
| myself (or my finances) out there for my work. I've had people
| ask me to pick up snacks for meetings and say I can just expense
| it later. Sorry...not happening. Someone decides they don't want
| to approve the expense and I'm holding the bill. Either give me a
| work credit card or figure out another way to order your stuff.
| Zenst wrote:
| I can vouch for that advice and equally double check.
|
| My story - I worked for a Canadian company Blackberry in the UK
| and they wanted me to go to the Seattle office for few weeks. I
| said I couldn't afford to be covering expenses and my manager
| said would sort that out, came along with a bit of paper saying
| was expense advance - sign that. Well, turns out he lied, was
| pay advance as I found out when I got paid say 12 hours TZ
| difference from my bank etc when my rent, council tax and
| everything bounced. So I'm on the other side of the World and
| chaos is starting to rain on my home back home. Now was a
| Canadian also there for a few weeks and not only had he got a
| proper expense advance, was 3x what I got (yes I was underpaid
| and that's another story) and was shocked how my boss messed
| up.
|
| Long story short, they never fixed the mess and caused me to
| have a breakdown, never did get my expenses back, lost my home
| and ended up with a massive council tax bill that took me years
| paying off and life went very downhill from there afterwards
| from one surreal predicament to another.
|
| So do remind your companies that you are not a bank, you are
| already working in areas for the company and never ever pay for
| expense stuff from your own money unless you can charge
| interest and penalty clauses for late paying.
| ipaddr wrote:
| Never agree to travel without them sending a plane ticket
| prepaid first.
| Zenst wrote:
| Oh I had that, just stitched up with salary advance instead
| of expense advance.
| jpambrun wrote:
| Even with a corporate credit card you are usually personally
| responsible until the expense is approved.
| happyopossum wrote:
| That depends on the card and how you acquired it. A corporate
| Amex is typically backed by the employee, but they are
| falling out of favor in part because of that.
|
| If you have a corporate card through a bank other than Amex,
| there's a very good chance you do not carry the liability for
| paying it.
|
| Your employer could come after you if they feel it was used
| improperly, but that's a very different can of worms than
| carrying credit liability.
| unsupp0rted wrote:
| > Barker says the stay has left him in legal limbo -- denying him
| the ability to clear his name, while giving the RCMP a free pass
| for a botched investigation. He says he has considered suing the
| investigating officer for defamation, but has been told by his
| attorney that the bar for success in such cases against the
| government is extremely high.
| mcv wrote:
| This sounds extraordinarily poorly handled by the RCMP. He could
| show that he purchased it from his own credit card and on Amazon,
| so that's pretty good evidence that he's the victim of fraud, not
| the perpetrator of it. Weird how extremely aggressive the RCMP
| is.
|
| That this is allowed to exist in legal limbo is ridiculous. He
| should be able to demand rectification and damages. And the real
| problem here is of course Amazon for enabling such scams. They
| should be on the hook for this, not some unsuspecting customer.
| And the real fraudster should be easy to track down through
| Amazon if they've done their due diligence.
| andy99 wrote:
| Yeah what I got from the story is how unprofessional the police
| were. Unless there's more too it, the whole thing sounds like
| it should be an administrative investigations where everyone
| involved is assumed to be a victim unless more evidence comes
| to light. But somehow they rushed to treat this guy like a
| criminal.
| BunsanSpace wrote:
| He's first nation/aboriginal.... It's racism.
| account-5 wrote:
| I can see incompetence on the police's part sure. What
| makes it racist?
| mnot wrote:
| You think that incompetence is evenly deployed no matter
| what the race of the accused?
| account-5 wrote:
| I don't think incompetence is something that can be
| deployed evenly or not. The article provides no
| information that I can see that makes it a racist cop
| targeting a minority. Or is it racist for any first
| nation/aboriginal person to be subject to a police
| investigation?
| asvitkine wrote:
| Theoretically, incompetence can be unevenly deployed if
| you assign incompetent people more predominantly to
| specific regions or cases.
| account-5 wrote:
| So theoretically the police chief is racistly deploying
| non-racist but known incompetent officers in the hopes
| their incompetence is going to adversely affect those
| specific regions or cases. That's leaving an awful lot to
| chance. I can think of more efficient and surefire ways
| to ensure those areas/cases are racially targeted, you
| could take Baltimore city as an example. But we're surely
| getting beyond any reasonable speculation of the
| information provided in the article?
| cbsmith wrote:
| Police incompetence has a way of being disproportionately
| common depending on your race. Knowing definitively that
| is what is happening here without a lot more context is
| difficult, but it's entirely possible this is textbook
| racism.
| account-5 wrote:
| But as you say, based in the information provided that
| conclusion is speculative at best. The sensible
| conclusion based on the information provided is
| incompetence. I think hanlons razor is applicable here
| cbsmith wrote:
| Yes, I do not think one can draw conclusions. However,
| much as one might wish to apply Hanlon's razor, Occam's
| razor also applies, and from a lot of people's
| perspective it cuts towards racism.
| account-5 wrote:
| But surely the fewest assumptions here points to
| incompetence? Or more kindly a lack of knowledge about
| the way the fraud was commited? Based on the information
| provided I'd side with belligerent incompetence.
|
| Based on the information would you conclude it was racist
| if the accused person was white? Would you conclude it
| was racist if the cop was also a first nation/aboriginal?
| I doubt it. What would your conclusion be then?
| mikeravkine wrote:
| The razor doesn't apply to the police.
| homero wrote:
| They want an arrest, rarely do police care who it is
| cbsmith wrote:
| > Unless there's more too it,
|
| There is definitely more to it. We're hearing the story from
| one side, and there are many good reasons why the parties on
| the other side wouldn't share all of their context. Honestly,
| as I was reading it, I was thinking that it was both
| conceivable this was a gross miscarriage of justice and an
| outright failing of the police forces, it's also entirely
| possible that the guy is as guilty as sin and they're just
| having trouble putting a case together (which is common when
| dealing with online fraud).
|
| Keep in mind the police forces might arrest someone, but it's
| the prosecutors that make the decision about whether to bring
| charges. The prosecutors _could_ have vacated the charge
| entirely, but chose not to. There 's a lot of possible
| explanations for why they didn't, but that part of it isn't
| the RCMP's responsibility.
| bparsons wrote:
| The RCMP, particularly in small towns are very bad at these
| types of investigations. The truly shocking thing is that they
| followed up on it at all.
| BobaFloutist wrote:
| I never really thought about it, but, looking them up it
| looks like they're basically the equivalent of the FBI(+ATF),
| but also sometimes are contracted for local policing by towns
| too small to maintain their own department? Is that accurate?
| morkalork wrote:
| Yes, and more. They are federal police like FBI. They used
| to do intelligence work (like the CIA?) until the 80s where
| after some scandals, a new security agency was created to
| take over for that responsibility. Then there's some
| provinces that use them like the equivalent of state
| troopers and local small town police. It's a mess and a
| ball of conflicts of interest.
| cbsmith wrote:
| The FBI also does intelligence work. What's different is
| that in Canada the RCMP take in local policing
| responsibilities where there's no local resources to do
| so themselves.
| morkalork wrote:
| How would you classify CSIS which is the successor to
| what the RCMP was doing?
| houseofzeus wrote:
| Largely, and in this case they'd likely be involved because
| of the latter type of jurisdiction.
| Scoundreller wrote:
| They technically have jurisdiction across the country (for
| federal offences) and might take on big cases (e.g.
| terrorism) anywhere.
|
| Think of them as the "default" service.
|
| In many provinces, they're the primary police service for
| all towns/cities except the largest ones.
|
| Other provinces have a provincial police service to be the
| default in towns/cities that don't have their own municipal
| police service.
| mthoms wrote:
| Straight out of training, RCMP officers almost always get
| posted to remote locations. Locations that nobody with any
| seniority will touch.
|
| These postings often require the new recruit to move - not
| just towns - but whole provinces away from their extended
| families. Throw in the cold, boring nature of these
| postings and what you get is a very bitter officer. One who
| is looking to pad their resume and move up the ranks and
| get out.
|
| It's also common for officers to be internally disciplined
| in this way; The best cops get the most prestigious
| postings, and the worst get the opposite (just like
| Catholic priests).
|
| (To be clear, I have no idea if this is true in this case -
| it's more of a generalization)
| actionfromafar wrote:
| As a foreigner, the only I have ever heard or seen of the RCMP
| is how courteous they are, with their red jackets, on fictional
| TV shows and movies, and how agressive they seem on the news.
| chromatin wrote:
| > As a foreigner, the only I have ever heard or seen of the
| RCMP is how courteous they are, with their red jackets, on
| fictional TV shows and movies, and how agressive they seem on
| the news.
|
| Canada has cultivated this image [of niceness] when in
| reality, their jack-booted state enforcers are just like
| every other country's.
| yieldcrv wrote:
| Starlight tours represent Canadian police, this article isn't
| about RCMP but the lack of accountability doesn't make a
| difference
|
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saskatoon_freezing_deaths
| pixelcloud wrote:
| In terms of the RCMP and their aggressive behaviour. It makes
| perfect sense. First Nations people have not been treated well
| by the RCMP or LE for a very long time in Canada... This still
| persists to this day, systematic discrimination and all that
| stuff.
| asvitkine wrote:
| Well, it doesn't make sense that this _still_ happens. You 'd
| think there would be policies and training to prevent this
| sort of thing nowadays...
| zoky wrote:
| That would require the Canadian government to admit they
| have a racism problem, which they steadfastly refuse to do.
| wubrr wrote:
| RCMP's main purpose is to serve as the enforcement arm of big
| corporate interests and politicians. Their secondary purpose is
| to serve themselves. Serving Canadians and upholding the law is
| like 30th on the list.
| tamimio wrote:
| Great, all it takes in Canada to ruin someone's life is to know
| their name and address, and a stolen card!
|
| I'm still missing one part, if that woman has her account hacked
| (plus the credit card, isn't it supposed to be encrypted in
| walmart site?), and that scammer sent the goods to the guy, how
| did the scammer know that the guy ordered the stuff in the first
| place?! The coordinated attack is a little too sophisticated for
| a stolen credit card, because that would assume the scammer is
| also hacking that guy amazon account? Unless the seller is the
| scammer or part of a scammer ring and whenever he placed that
| order, they used the woman card to make the purchases, but why
| bother, they could've just used that card somewhere else, harder
| to track and a higher outcome? something isn't adding up.
|
| That being said, I always use virtual cards for anything online,
| and those are a "prepaid credit cards".
| papercrane wrote:
| > how did the scammer know that the guy ordered the stuff in
| the first place?!
|
| The idea is the scammer is the seller on Amazon. So the guy
| orders from Amazon Marketplace, the Marketplace seller uses a
| hacked Wal-Mart account to fulfill the order and pockets the
| cash from Amazon.
| tamimio wrote:
| What's the point or the advantage of doing so? The card will
| be cancelled right after and instead of using the max amount
| of that card, now you are only limited with what left after
| purchasing that goods, from the scammer perspective, I don't
| see how's this any better than maxing the card somewhere
| online instead, unless I'm missing something.
| andrewla wrote:
| I think the idea is that the scammer gets a legitimate
| payment from the receiver, and charges a bad payment to the
| sender. The sender cancels their card, and reverses the
| charge, so now Walmart is out the money and out the item.
| But the receiver card is not cancelled because they
| actually intended to use it, and received the goods that
| they ordered, so Amazon pays out to them for fulfilling the
| order.
|
| The problem with maxing out the stolen card is that you
| can't get cash -- you can get stuff, but even then, you
| have to give away your address.
| tamimio wrote:
| Very interesting! I think the next step for that guy is
| to go after amazon for enabling the scam and being the
| front-end.
| beaeglebeached wrote:
| Another interesting twist of this happened to me. Someone
| created two eBay accounts. One in my name, one as a
| seller. They used my card to pay the seller with my
| forged eBay account.
|
| Then they found the tracking number of a package sent to
| my city around the same time.
|
| Ultimately the charge back failed when I reported fraud.
| They had a tracking number and invoice in my name, which
| my bank and eBay said had to be me. When I asked eBay to
| refund, they said the opposite as what they said to my
| bank. They said only the creator of the account could
| refund, not the person named on the account, so I could
| only refund if I found the fraudster and got their
| consent.
| cantrevealname wrote:
| > _Barker said he bought seven "Step2 All Around Playtime Patio
| with Canopy" sets from a seller on Amazon.ca, using his payment
| card on file to pay nearly $2,000 for the items._
|
| Presumably Baker would have immediately shown the RCMP the Amazon
| transaction record for his (legitimate) payment to the
| (fraudulent) seller. And that Baker's payment to the seller would
| have been timestamped before the seller perpetrated the fraud on
| the Walmart account and shipped the goods to Baker.
|
| If you saw the timeline above, and you believed the transaction
| records were accurate (and I assume the RCMP has the means to
| verify those transaction records with Amazon and Walmart), then
| what would you conclude was going on?
|
| Would you assume that Baker was a master criminal who was acting
| as both the buyer and crooked seller, and was covering his tracks
| with a prepayment from himself (as the buyer) to himself (as the
| seller), thereby creating a transaction record to give plausible
| deniability?
|
| Even the most cynical jaded hard-edged RCMP officer should see
| that doesn't make sense. Either the investigation was very
| incompetent or there's some more detail to the story that we
| haven't heard.
| race_condition wrote:
| No need to presume.
|
| > _Eager to clear his name, Barker said he shared with the
| police copies of his credit card bills and purchase history at
| Amazon. But on April 21, the investigator called again to say
| he was coming to arrest Barker for theft._
| beeburrt wrote:
| Here's a Defcon talk about this:
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2IT2oAzTcvU
| deadbabe wrote:
| As someone whose been accused before of something I didn't do, by
| people who were damn sure I had done it, it can be a very
| stressful traumatic experience, it doesn't sound like a big deal
| until it happens to you. Don't just hurl nasty messages at
| someone you don't know and don't even have 100% proof they have
| wronged you.
| ekanes wrote:
| > He says he has considered suing the investigating officer for
| defamation, but has been told by his attorney that the bar for
| success in such cases against the government is extremely high.
|
| Canada is a relatively less litigious country, but it seems he
| was harmed quite materially by losing his job. I'm not sure why
| they'd arrest him if he could show he placed the order the way
| anyone else would through his Amazon account.
| reso wrote:
| The RCMP is an extremely troubled police force (like many). There
| was a mass shooting event in 2020 in rural Nova Scotia, and it is
| not an exaggeration to say that the RCMP response made Uvalde
| look good in comparison. RCMP officers attacked civilians at a
| designated safe shelter, failed to warn the public of the danger
| for 12 hours leading to more deaths, and there is circumstantial
| evidence that the shooter himself may have been a RCMP
| confidential informant. There has been no credible investigation
| or accountability. The podcast Canadaland Commons has an episode
| on the Portapique incident I highly recommend.
|
| Accountability for police forces and other elements of the
| criminal justice system seems to be a critical unsolved problem
| in western societies.
| wubrr wrote:
| 100%, RCMP is extremely corrupt and incompetent.
| FpUser wrote:
| Until we make our fucking "servants" including police accountable
| for abuse of power and what they do to people it'll keep
| happening.
| Wowfunhappy wrote:
| I have a feeling I'm just naive, but... I did not realize merely
| being arrested gave you a criminal record. That would seem to go
| against "innocent until proven guilty." Is this Canada-specific
| or does it also apply in the US?
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