The Secret Service has recovered $286 million stolen by scammers from a COVID-19 recovery fund for small businesses.
Approximately $87 billion in Economic Injury Disaster Loans have gone missing since the federal program was formed in the COVID-19 pandemic's early stages, NBC News reported.
The Secret Service announced Friday that it had traced the $286 million to Green Dot Bank in Texas, where 15,000 accounts were created using fake or stolen identities. After obtaining debit cards, the fraudsters were flagged by the bank when they siphoned off money from the EIDL program and attempted to access the funds
The scheme is likely part of a larger national and international network, the Secret Service said.
"This is not going to be a quick fix," said Assistant Special Agent in Charge Roy Dotson. "This is one case. ... It’s going to be a long process." --->READ MORE HERE
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| AP Photo/Julia Nikhinson, File |
The Secret Service said Friday it has helped recover and return to the government nearly $2.3 billion in bogus pandemic benefits, including a major new operation that netted nearly $300 million in fraudulent small business loans.
Agents in the Secret Service’s Orlando, Florida, office noticed that fraudsters were using a particular payment system, Green Dot Bank, to move their money around. Working with the bank, the service said it identified more than 15,000 accounts that were being used to funnel money stolen by fraud.
Agents seized $286 million from those accounts and returned the money to the Small Business Administration.
The government doled out about $835 billion in Paycheck Protection Program loans and allocated another $500 billion for Economic Injury Disaster Loans, both of which were meant to keep smaller businesses afloat during pandemic shutdowns.
Another $718 billion went out the door for enhanced unemployment benefits.
All of those programs were beset with major fraud. --->READ MORE HEREFollow links below to relevant/related stories and resources:
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