# How Uber ghost rides are linked to online money laundering



## jocker12 (May 11, 2017)

Online service marketplaces are relatively new, and there are few ways for their operators to regularly monitor the entirety of services and transactions. Unfortunately, this creates an open environment for electronic money laundering, known as 'transaction laundering,' to occur.

Last November, we all discovered that no one is immune to cyber crime, when The Daily Beast published an article showing that Airbnb had been exposed to online payment system exploitation. The scam is simple: fraudsters use stolen credit cards to launder dirty money through complicit Airbnb hosts they meet in underground, online Russian forums.

Once the Airbnb booking transaction is processed, no one actually stays at the swanky (or not so swanky), advertised accommodation. Instead, the two parties split the payment and create fake end-of-stay reviews to close the transaction loop.

Because Airbnb spans thousands of locations over numerous governing jurisdictions, cyber criminals can easily capitalize on it and hide behind the huge operational scope. The current tools and processes in place to detect illegal or illicit activity are not enough to monitor the sheer volume of transactions that occur.

Uber now faces exploitations similar to Airbnb, but the transaction laundering process becomes a bit more complicated, albeit conceptually parallel: users of a laundering service pay for "ghost rides" - rides that they never took.

*How the Uber scam works*
Here's how it works: the client employs a money laundering service to seek out and hire complicit Uber drivers looking to make an extra buck, who then accept ride requests from money laundering clients at pre-established rates.

Laundering large amounts of money is also pretty simple: multiple drivers are involved in the scheme, easily increasing the volume.

Then, after Uber takes its standard cut from the "ghost rides," the complicit drivers distribute their earnings to the operator of the laundering scheme. The operator takes a cut, and passes along the remaining, clean money to the client.

Transaction laundering through Uber simply wouldn't work without drivers willing to be part of the scam to earn their piece of the pie.

These "ghost ride" driving positions are viewed as highly valuable - providing additional revenue streams at minimal risk and involving little to no work. In fact, the positions are increasingly being advertised on online forums and have links with step-by-step guides to effectively execute the scam.

*Why specifically Airbnb and Uber?*
Money laundering through online platforms is highly popular among criminals because there's no overhead to the operation, and no need to create a false business or entity, or to deal with real or fake goods.

Not to mention, these popular platforms are global-reaching and immense, allowing scammers to seamlessly cross borders with no regulatory eye keeping watch.

With the revolution of online marketplaces, comes additional risk: Transaction laundering has become rampant among many of the marketplaces we regularly visit. While the scam is a bit different than that which occurred with Airbnb and Uber, the idea is very similar. An unknown business uses the payment credentials of a legitimate merchant to process credit card payments for products and services, typically of illicit or illegal nature.

The core of ecommerce is the buying and selling of products and services through the internet. The process has become easy, involving just a few clicks and some data entry, and the transaction is nearly instant. Today, setting up an illegal operation for transaction laundering is just as easy as the ecommerce process, seeing that it can be done in a matter of minutes by anybody with a bit of online savvy and the motivation to commit fraud.

The scary reality is that this cyber crime becomes nearly undetectable to the major players who process millions of payments a day. And along the payment processing pipeline, all players - marketplace, credit card companies, and issuing banks - are responsible for the credibility of the transaction, knowingly or unknowingly.

What's even scarier is that it's estimated that transaction laundering for online sales of products and services is more than $200 billion a year in the US alone. With the high volume of transactions through online marketplaces and now the online service marketplaces, like Uber and Airbnb, that number will surely increase.

https://thenextweb.com/contributors/2018/03/18/uber-ghost-rides-linked-online-money-laundering/


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## SEAL Team 5 (Dec 19, 2015)

jocker12 said:


> Then, after Uber takes its standard cut from the "ghost rides," the complicit drivers distribute their earnings to the operator of the laundering scheme. The operator takes a cut, and passes along the remaining, clean money to the client.
> 
> Transaction laundering through Uber simply wouldn't work without drivers willing to be part of the scam to earn their piece of the pie.


Typical scenario:

Criminal: Hey Uber driver, you wanna help me launder $10k? You only have to drive an additional 50,000 miles and I'll give you an extra $1,000. Deal?

Uber driver: Uhhhh, ok.


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## uberdriverfornow (Jan 10, 2016)

this article is stupid, drivers have no control over payments at all


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## dirtylee (Sep 2, 2015)

Uber fees @ 25/30% not including the upfront make this flat out impossible. There are cheaper ways to launder money.


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## tohunt4me (Nov 23, 2015)

Wher


jocker12 said:


> Online service marketplaces are relatively new, and there are few ways for their operators to regularly monitor the entirety of services and transactions. Unfortunately, this creates an open environment for electronic money laundering, known as 'transaction laundering,' to occur.
> 
> Last November, we all discovered that no one is immune to cyber crime, when The Daily Beast published an article showing that Airbnb had been exposed to online payment system exploitation. The scam is simple: fraudsters use stolen credit cards to launder dirty money through complicit Airbnb hosts they meet in underground, online Russian forums.
> 
> ...


Where do we Sign Up ?

FINALLY !

A way to make money with Uber Again !


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## dirtylee (Sep 2, 2015)

However, if the money launderer was okay with paying 25% + booking fee & a nice fee for the driver...

I could see a full time uber x/taxi driver that has a second phone running lyft premier that has much looser card requirements {prepaid credit cards - you can't transfer money from them easily} quickly burning thru thousands in rides per day. Assuming nothing gets flagged.

Still, kinda non efficient at all for moving millions.


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## transporter007 (Feb 19, 2018)

tohunt4me said:


> Wher
> 
> Where do we Sign Up ?
> 
> ...


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## tohunt4me (Nov 23, 2015)

transporter007 said:


>


" Side Hustle"


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## at-007smartLP (Oct 27, 2017)

they dont call it air bed n brothel in tbe streets for nothing


trick orders prostitutes pimps xl, select, black car keeps meter running round trip or through day

handjob 20 tip 20 cash
flash my tatas 10 tip
night cap change destination to atm & ill come up for coffee

its only 7K to clone app with your own branding in both app stores

in a few years everyone can have their own private invite only gps pairing app for probably less than 3K, where ratings will matter & you can sell & "share" whatever you want at whatever price..

all the thing we know uber is guilty of imagine what we dont know, if you dint think they skimming from millions of rides/drivers a day a short a minute here a mile there, a toll every random programmed time it probably wouldn't take 10 replies to bots to get $1 credit lol

its all by design #uberisHannibalthecannibaldevouringhumansandcars


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## Tnasty (Mar 23, 2016)

Maybe Travis is in on it or Fuber management.


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## SatMan (Mar 20, 2017)

Well, there's another "security" fee the riders/drivers will have to pay now!


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## Ruined Your Life (Mar 10, 2018)

Yeah article makes no sense...

Just give me 100k and give me a 1099 for landscaping that I never will do to your lawn..... still have to pay my taxes and a fee for me doing this.....but through Uber you would lose 50% off the top through upfront pricing


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## tohunt4me (Nov 23, 2015)

Ruined Your Life said:


> Yeah article makes no sense...
> 
> Just give me 100k and give me a 1099 for landscaping that I never will do to your lawn..... still have to pay my taxes and a fee for me doing this.....but through Uber you would lose 50% off the top through upfront pricing


I like to sell " Cajun Recipees" online . . .
Cheaper than channeling a believable mail volume.

When i was younger
There was a nightclub
With a DC 3 in the roof called the " Crash Landing".
They would have nickel night beers . . .
Now . . . on the " books" those beers may have sold for $5.00 each . . . .
Volume aligned with cashflow.

Couldnt imagine what the Real business might have been . . . no subtle hints there at all . . .

They also had a plywood box( room size) in middle of dance floor.
Sponsered a contest.
First couple to conceive that entered box and signed up won $10,000.00.


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## Ruined Your Life (Mar 10, 2018)

I like selling fake recipes online for shake n bake meth in exchange for bitcoin

I havent yet had anyone call the cops complaining the meth recipe I sold them didnt work

Call me Uncle Fester



tohunt4me said:


> I like to sell " Cajun Recipees" online . . .
> Cheaper than channeling a believable mail volume.


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## tohunt4me (Nov 23, 2015)

Ruined Your Life said:


> I like selling fake recipes online for shake n bake meth in exchange for bitcoin
> 
> I havent yet had anyone call the cops complaining the meth recipe I sold them didnt work
> 
> Call me Uncle Fester


Uncle Fester was modeled after Aleister Crowley.

And
Jimmy Page had bought Crowleys old home on Loch Ness . . .

" Many miles away,Something crawls from the slime at the bottom of a Dark Scottish Loch . . .many miles away"- Synchronicity/ Sting.

The closer you look, the weirder it gets . . .

( if you REALLY want a case of the " "willies" research the number of Necromancy Occultists Running our Government in the last 2 centuries 322)


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## uberdriverfornow (Jan 10, 2016)

there is no benefit of this over giving rides to anyone else, and why would they need to give the driver anything more than what is being done in the app

like i said, this article lacks logic


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## Adieu (Feb 21, 2016)

Ruined Your Life said:


> I like selling fake recipes online for shake n bake meth in exchange for bitcoin
> 
> I havent yet had anyone call the cops complaining the meth recipe I sold them didnt work
> 
> Call me Uncle Fester


Why not just sell the real one? Liability issues?


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## Jesusdrivesuber (Jan 5, 2017)

Thank god the feds still havent found the real money laundering going on in Airbnb and Uber/Lyft.

Their discoveries are ********* newbies at best.


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## uberdriverfornow (Jan 10, 2016)

tohunt4me said:


> Uncle Fester was modeled after Aleister Crowley.
> 
> And
> Jimmy Page had bought Crowleys old home on Loch Ness . . .
> ...


the rumor goes that Barbara Bush is Crowley's daughter


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## Disgusted Driver (Jan 9, 2015)

I can see the AirBnB thing since you can easily set something up that would generate a couple thousand a week, pay taxes on it and all are happy. But Uber or Lyft rides? Even if you had a second phone and ordered a Lyft ride from yourself every time you did an Uber ride, at what point in time would they cut you off for having a million rides between the same passenger and driver assuming you were even able to get the ping each time. How much could you possibly launder per week and lose 30-40% for the privilege. Even if you did gps spoofing, it's too much work for too little laundering. What ever happened to the good old days of cigarette machines or laundromats?


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## Ant-Man (Nov 22, 2017)

I think they meant to use embezzle when they said launder.


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