Community Chat

[proudlyfromNJ]

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@Ladygray wrote:

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@proudlyfromNJ wrote:

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@Spurt wrote:

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@Isobel Archer wrote:

We sent a birthday card containing a check  - deposited in a mail box outside the post office - on Sun Apr 3.  On Monday Apr 4, the check was altered (different payee and with a significant increase in amount) and cashed.

We reported this to the bank, the Postal Investigative Service and to the local police.

I read an article where theft from mail boxes is increasing at an alarming rate.  Apparently, it is safer to mail inside the post office.

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@Isobel Archer 

And this is an issue that doesn't just happen at mailboxes outside the Post Office....back in the good ole days people had invidiual mailboxes in front of their homes, but then they started these banks of COMMUNITY MAILBOXES in subdivisions, condos, and apartments and they are always being broken into....The Police Department includes a notice in our Neighborhood Newsletter advising everyone to pick up their mail in a timely manner when there's been an incident of mail theft in the area.....and it seems to happen more and more frequently.....

Ours was broken into last year and we had to pick up our mail at the Post Office until the Community Mailbox was repaired and when I went to get my mail there was a long line of people from other subdivisions that had also experienced a break in.....its become a major problem...😫

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@Spurt  Around here everyone has individual mailboxes at the bottom of their driveway. Mailman drives his truck and delivers the mail. If the flag is up he takes the mail with him back to the PO. I don't think I'll let my husband do that anymore though.

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There are few of those home mail boxes around my neighborhood where the mail is just left in them.  That is so dangerous.  Anyone can take your mail.  I can't believe the post office who brings mail to those boxes hasn't changed that system and made the HOA's add locked boxes.   We're not living in the 50's anymore.  

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@Ladygray  HOA? We don't have that here. We live in a woodsy neighborhood and no one tells us what to do except for any town rules that there might be. Our houses do not look alike and were built at different times. The mail truck delivers to the mailboxes on the street and the walking mailmen deliver to each individual  home nearer to town that are closer together. No lock boxes except for apartment buildings.

[Lipstickdiva]

They have been talking on national news about how much mail theft is up.  No one is making any of this up.

Last week there was also a story about scams involving Zelle transactions.

[Roni18]

I started using pens that are supposed to help prevent check fraud when I saw a story on our local news about theft of bills left in personal mailboxes to be picked up.  I then started dropping mine off at the Post Office or official post office boxes.  Now I guess I will have to start going into the post office to mail.  I saw a recent article about increased postal theft and it said that all it takes is for someone to have a postbox key (like they've made a copy key or got their hands on a official key someway.)   The pens I use are uni-ball 207 Gel which are supposed to help against fraud.

[MorningLover]

This is a good article. A Georgia State professor and his students are tracking a thriving underground market for stolen checks.

The Conversation

Published: January 5, 2022 

David Maimon

Associate Professor of Criminal Justice and Criminology, Georgia State University

Criminals are increasingly targeting U.S. Postal Service and personal mailboxes to pilfer filled-out checks and sell them over the internet using social media platforms. The buyers then alter the payee and amount listed on the checks to rob victims’ bank accounts of thousands of dollars.

While the banks themselves typically bear the financial burden and reimburse targeted accounts, criminals can use the checks to steal victims’ identities, which can have severe consequences. 

I founded and now direct Georgia State University’s Evidence Based Cybersecurity Research Group, which is aimed at learning what works and what doesn’t in preventing cybercrime. For the past two years, we’ve been surveilling 60 black market communication channels on the internet to learn more about the online fraud ecosystem and gather data on it in a systematic way in order to spot trends.

One thing we didn’t expect to see was a surge in purloined checks...

full article..

https://theconversation.com/how-cybercriminals-turn-paper-checks-stolen-from-mailboxes-into-bitcoin-...

[Moonlady]

It must be the pits to have area mailboxes targeted for theft/vandalism.


Ours are safe. I've never had trouble with the checks I mail, either. We use the drive-in boxes, which have long, narrow chutes. Nobody's gotten in there, and nobody ever will.

[Isobel Archer]

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@Moonlady wrote:

It must be the pits to have area mailboxes targeted for theft/vandalism.


Ours are safe. I've never had trouble with the checks I mail, either. We use the drive-in boxes, which have long, narrow chutes. Nobody's gotten in there, and nobody ever will.

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Um - the drive through mail box at the Post Office I used had a long narrow chute as well.

Good luck with your theory.

[Duckncover]

I send birthday money via e-giftcards or Zelle. 

[Duckncover]

Due to shortage of workers, the mailboxes here are not emptied as often as the times posted on the box near the mail slot. The last time I attempted to put a piece of mail into the slot, it was so full, letters were literally sticking out of the mailbox. Why would anyone put their mail into the slot knowing    It won't even go down into the box? Easy pickings for any thief who comes by.  I had to take my mail inside the post office. Also, don't use those drop boxes at night; ups the chances that your mail we be stolen.

[Cakers3]

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@Isobel Archer wrote:

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@Linda0215 wrote:

This is nothing new.  It's been going on for years. When thieves see an envelope that looks like it might be a birthday card, they assume there is cash in it and it is stolen.  It's even been an ongoing problem within the Postal Service itself.  What I don't understand is the brazen altering of the check.  Shame on the bank that cashed it.  I work for a bank and the tellers are thoroughly trained to look out for anything that looks slightly suspicious. Protocol is the teller should bring it to the attention of the branch manager for investigation.  That teller would have been fired if this happened at my bank.   No questions asked. I'm sorry you had to go through that.   Crooks work overtime trying to cheat the public.  They should just get a job.  

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The deposit was done online.  Not sure what kind of security they have for that.  Our bank is BOA.  It was deposited into a TD bank account.  BOA is investigating and expects to retrieve their (our) money.

The article I read said there are ways to remove the ink from the check and rewrite it.  The online check in our bank statement shows the original signature - but the date, payee and amount are all printed in a clearly different hand - but there is no other evidence that anything was altered.  You can't see any erasure or other indication of change.

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@Isobel Archer   I remember years ago it was recommended to use a gel ink pen. The gel ink allows tiny particles to be embedded in the paper and this makes check washing more difficult.

Like most people here, we pay online but once in a blue moon a check is needed such as renewing our passports.

[seaBreeze]

Several 'birthday cards' I mailed from my mailbox were never 'received'.  Assuming 'someone' thought money might be inside before they reached their destination, I no longer use colored envelopes...too much temptation apparently...happened too many times to be a coincidence.