Crime is flourishing in the Americas, particularly violent crime. The murder rate remains very high, at more than 20 per 100,000 inhabitants. The expansion of the drug trade, which is stronger than ever, has nourished the criminal landscape from the once-tranquil Uruguay to the perpetually troubled Guatemala. Armed groups born from the drug trade are seeking new businesses, left and right, top and bottom.
In July 2024, two men walked into his office holding guns, he testified with the help of a Mandarin interpreter. Pointing their weapons at his chest, the pair demanded money. He told them he had none. According to authorities, this was an old-fashioned shakedown carried out by the largest gang in the city, Pomona 12th Street. The Times is not identifying the witness over concerns about his safety.
The researcher, Jonathan Clark, says he knows this for a fact because he reported the attack to Coinbase on January 7 after the criminals tried to scam him. According to Clark, Coinbase's Head of Trust and Safety Brett Farmer responded to his "comprehensive security report" the same day he emailed it to the company's security@ address. In a blog about the incident, Clark says Farmer replied: "This report is super robust and gives us a lot to look into. We are investigating this scammer now."
A Brampton man has been arrested following two extortion related shootings in Caledon and Brampton, Peel police announced on Sunday. One suspect is still outstanding, police say. On Oct. 26, police say surveillance footage shows two people firing shots at a Caledon residence near Old School Road and Creditview Road just before 3 a.m. Earlier in the footage, one of the shooters is seen lighting fire on the resident's driveway, according to the press release.
Ernesto is 43 years old and works more than 16 hours a day as a bus driver in Lima. He has always enjoyed his job, is patient with passengers, and likes driving. But he doesn't any more. He knows that every day he risks death. Nearly 70 public transport drivers have been murdered this year in Peru by hitmen for refusing to pay extortion money, according to police data.
Martin had apparently seen how this system worked in practice through his job, and he approached a pair of other people to help him make some easy cash. One of these people was allegedly Ryan Goldberg of Watkinsville, Georgia, who worked as an incident manager at the cybersecurity firm Sygnia. Goldberg told the FBI that Martin had recruited him to "try and ransom some companies."
Shortly before the presser, news broke that Portland Trail Blazers head coach Chauncey Billups, Miami Heat guard Terry Rozier, and former NBA player and coach Damon Jones had been among the 31 charged by the federal law enforcement. Billups was charged for his alleged role in a Mafia-backed illegal poker operation; Rozier was charged for his role in a sports betting operation; and Jones was allegedly involved in both.
The trial for an investor who allegedly kidnapped Ontario's self-proclaimed 'Crypto King' after losing hundreds of thousands of dollars to him is set to begin Tuesday in Toronto. Akil Heywood, 41, is facing three charges related to the alleged kidnapping of Aiden Pleterski in early December 2022, and two counts of extortion. Heywood was one of five men charged in July 2023 in connection with the alleged kidnapping.
The Qantas data, which was stolen from a Salesforce database in a major cyber-attack in June, included customers' email addresses, phone numbers, birth dates and frequent flyer numbers. It did not contain credit card details, financial information or passport details. On Saturday the group marked the data as leaked, writing: Don't be the next headline, should have paid the ransom.
"While Coberg stood watch over the victim, Iza demanded - and recorded a video of - the victim transferring $127,000 to a bank account Iza controlled," the statement said. "Iza then directed his security guards to take away the victim's passport."
The ShinyHunters extortion group claims to have stolen over 1.5 billion Salesforce records from 760 companies using compromised Salesloft Drift OAuth tokens. For the past year, the threat actors have been targeting Salesforce customers in data theft attacks using social engineering and malicious OAuth applications to breach Salesforce instances and download data. The stolen data is then used to extort companies into paying a ransom to prevent the data from being publicly leaked.
According to the indictment, around November 2022, Echeverrias paid for the victim to come to New York from Mexico and live with the defendant for approximately six months. During that time, the victim was forced to pay Echeverrias $800 a night by having sex with various men on Roosevelt Avenue. The victim was also coerced into robbing the men to meet a daily quota set by the defendant. The victim was physically harmed and slapped when she did not comply.
"Agentic AI has been weaponized," the company said in a . "AI models are now being used to perform sophisticated cyber attacks, not just advise on how to carry them out."
The lawsuit alleges that the woman sought to extort money from John Gomez and was involved in a plot to damage his reputation through coordinated efforts with multiple attorneys.
After the victim informed the account she knew he was scamming her, he reportedly threatened to expose explicit pictures she'd sent him if she didn't forward him $10,000.
