Scamming the elderly

Investment Analysis Clubs Macro Economic Trends and Risks
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During the pandemic, and after, Bank of America’s EDD account service (Employment Development Dept.) for California has seen billions of dollars go overseas in stolen EDD fraud. The EDD estimates it gave $19 billion to fraudsters.

I believe that in the EDD fraud, Bank of America was complicit. Since the beginning of the year, EDD switched to a new financial partner to issue pre-paid debt cards for unemployment, disability, and Paid Family Leave benefit payments.

If I may provide an antidotal occurrence with my EDD account from a few years ago. After my shoulder surgery, I was provided the benefit payment for DI which was a bi-weekly payment on the Bank of America EDD account. I would always immediately move the money to my Checking Account with another bank. After one of the payments, I received a text message about my current balance. I did click on the link, and it sent to the BofA EDD website. When I eventually logged into my account, the payment was gone.
I talked to the BofA fraud dept. and they said it was clearly fraud and I would be refunded. However, one month later BofA sent me an email and said they couldn’t verify that this transfer was fraudulent, and thus no refund. When I talk to BofA subsequently, they said that there was no way to confirm what bank account the transfer was made to.
Question: How did the scammer know about my EDD DI funding the exact morning that it occurred?
Question: How did they log into my account and change my password and phone number?
Question: How did they know the exact amount of the payment to the penny?
Question: How can BofA make a transfer to a bank account that they have no information?
As I said, I believe that people inside the bank are either complicit or are selling information. Since that time, as I said, BofA has been replaced with EDD Money Network. However, my daughter began a maternity leave this year, and her first paid family leave (PFL) payment was also transferred fraudulently out of her account. Money Network was able to refund the full amount and said that they have a record of the account to where the money was fraudulently transferred. I find it hard to believe that a few years ago BofA had no way to identify the fraudulent account in my case.

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It is all automated, so no verification is done.

Most likely, there is a hacker’s hidden program on their system. When an account gets $$, the hacker is immediately notified and the program transfers the funds out–to an account controlled by hacker. Again, it is all automated. So the funds get moved multiple times–likely out of the US.

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Well, All of the transfers that I made required a drivers license with an address that corresponded to the address on the EDD account.
First, at the time BofA had a record of all the transactions from the Bank of America EDD account. Second, when I first contacted the fraud dept. (which I did within minutes of the fraud transaction) I was told that there was a fraudulent transfer. I could see the last four numbers of the account on my online EDD account. Also, the fraudster had changed information in the EDD account, i.e., phone number, password, etc.
But more suspicious was the timing. The funds were made available just a couple hours before the fraudulent transfer. There are cases where people use their EDD account like a bank account and just leave their money sitting there.

In my case, the funds received to the EDD account were always transferred to my legitimate account at another bank. The fraudulent transfer in my case was done within a couple hours after the funds were made available, and the scammer knew the exact amount of the funds available, including the $1 fee for the transfer. With the EDD account, if you try to make a transfer for more than the amount plus the $1 fee, the account can not transfer funds for 24 hours.

It has already been documented in court cases that Bank of America was complicit in fraud transfers from EDD accounts; billions of dollars of fraudulent transfers.

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