fake invoice scams
,

Fake Invoice Scams: Directory Listings, Domain Renewals, and Marketing Offers

An envelope lands on the accounts payable desk. It names your company, lists your website domain, shows an account number and a due date, and asks for a few hundred dollars to keep a “listing” active. Nobody ordered it, but it looks routine, so it gets paid. That is how fake invoice scams work. They […]
Read more
merchant cash advance scams

Merchant Cash Advance Scams and Predatory Lenders: Red Flags Every Business Owner Should Know

A restaurant owner signs a short “advance” agreement. Within weeks, daily debits drain the operating account and the lender threatens a lawsuit. This is how many merchant cash advance scams begin. In June 2026, the New York Attorney General sued Rapid Ruling, an arbitration platform accused of secretly working with a lender to rig outcomes. […]
Read more
embezzlement
,

17 Counts in 4 Months: How a Newspaper Bookkeeper Allegedly Embezzled $18K

A small newspaper trusts its bookkeeper with the company credit card. Four months later, roughly $18,000 has quietly moved through unauthorized charges before anyone notices. That is the outline of a recent case out of Curry County, New Mexico, where a former Eastern New Mexico News bookkeeper was charged with 17 counts of embezzlement, plus […]
Read more
oil prices drop before peace deals Detection signs Fraud & Order tips
,

Why Oil Prices Drop Before Peace Deals and What Insider Trading Looks Like to a Fraud Investigator

When Brent crude slid toward $70 a barrel in mid-2026, after months above $90 during the Strait of Hormuz crisis, most people saw a headline about cheaper gas. A fraud investigator sees something else: a moment where a handful of people almost certainly knew a peace framework was coming before the market did and some […]
Read more
money mules
, ,

What the Newcastle $100M Laundering Case Reveals About How Money Mules Get Trapped

In February 2026, a 47-year-old man from Newcastle, Washington pleaded guilty to helping launder nearly $100 million in fraud proceeds. He set up nine business entities with legitimate-sounding names like Apex Oil and Gas Trading, accepted money from investors who thought they were funding oil and gas storage, then funneled it to coconspirators’ bank accounts […]
Read more
small business fraud
,

The Most Common Fraud Method We See in Small Businesses, Ranked by Frequency

Small businesses lose more to fraud, dollar for dollar, than the giants do. According to the Association of Certified Fraud Examiners (ACFE) 2024 Report to the Nations, organizations with fewer than 100 employees suffered a median loss of $141,000 per case, and the typical organization loses roughly 5 percent of its annual revenue to fraud […]
Read more
, ,

Which Industries Hire Us Most for Fraud Investigations (And What That Says About Risk)

Patterns tell a story. After decades of casework, one thing becomes clear: fraud does not strike every industry equally. Some sectors call for a fraud investigation far more often than others, and the reasons are rarely random. Where money moves fast, oversight is thin, or trust is assumed rather than verified, fraud follows. The numbers […]
Read more
$642K Stolen From a Contractor
,

$642K Stolen From a Contractor, 8 Years in Prison: What the Jaragosky Case Teaches Small Businesses

She was hired in 2018. She started stealing in April 2019. She was not caught until March 2025. Nearly six years. One employee. $642,013.90 gone from a mechanical services contractor in Eugene, Oregon. In March 2026, a Lane County judge sentenced Melisa Ann Juline Jaragosky to 96 months in prison plus two years of post-prison […]
Read more