Black Money or Wash wash scam and iPage

This is the dismissive reply that compelled me to start this blog.

For those who don't know the 'Black Money', 'Wash Wash' or 'Defaced Currency' Scam is where victims are shown a trunkbox full of black construction paper lightly covered in talcum powder and told that it's actually money that's been coated either to evade customs and smuggle it out of a country, or for security reasons. While it can be and is used as a scam in its own right, it is often used at the end of a consignment scam when the victim is either unwilling or unable to pay any more, where it is used to convince the victim that the money exists, it is, in fact, right in front of them.

They are then shown by a 'technician' the cleaning of one or two of these notes using special chemicals. Of course the notes being 'cleaned' are real, simple sleight of hand has switched the construction paper for real bank notes coated in glue and iodine, and the special chemicals nothing more than a liquid containing vitamin C. The real bank notes emerge from the wash and the victim is convinced to part with more money to procure enough chemical solution to clean the rest of the notes.

Once the victim has the notes and solution they are never able to clean their money. They then need to find another supplier able to sell these miraculous and strangely named chemicals, such as SSD Solution, Vectrol Paste, Ogl Magic, Zuta S4, Ks Solution77B, Ttz Universal Solution, and Activation Powder.

This is where the fake sites claiming to sell these chemicals comes in.

The site serves several purposes, they reinforce the idea that the problem of Black Money exists, that chemicals exist to solve this problem, and they set out the fraudsters stall of these chemicals.

 To a normal person seeing a site that sells these products it is blindingly clear that the site is up to no good.

But not iPage.

This was their response when I asked them to investigate internationalpurelaboratory.com, which claims to sell these products proudly.

"Hello,

Thank you for making us aware of this. Because the goods are not being sold on the website, this is not a violation of our Terms of Service. We have notified the customer of your contact today and will monitor for additional complaints.

Regards,

Executive Response"

Have a look and see for yourself if you think this site matches up with their Acceptable Use Policy, which states that:

"Utilize the Services in connection with any illegal activity or activity otherwise prohibited by this AUP. Without limiting the general application of this rule, Users may not:

• Utilize the Services for or in connection with any activities or content determined by iPage, in its sole discretion, to be related to gambling, adult, obscene or pornographic materials or content, harassment, defamation, libel and hate speech or other offensive speech or content, or for any unlawful purpose, including without limitation, fraud, money laundering, child pornography, terrorist-related activities, activities in violation of U.S. export or import laws, any executive orders, or any rules, regulations or orders issued by Office of Foreign Asset Controls ("OFAC"), infringement on rights of others, trafficking in illegal drugs, or any products or services that are prohibited under applicable law, or which iPage determines to be controversial or disruptive to the operations of iPage or any other User or third party;"

 Since internationalpurelaboratory.com offers

"cleaning all type of blackened, tainted and defaced notes"

"We clean all types of black, green,white note or deface note."

 If that isn't literally money laundering, what is?


Update 9 Apr 15: iPage has now suspended this fraudulent site.

"Hello,

I have reviewed this further with our legal team and we have decided against hosting this customer. Thank you for making us aware of this.

Regards,

Executive Response"

Thank you, iPage.