Borrowing from the playbook of corporations seeking better ways to track employee productivity, some cybercriminal gangs are investing in technologies that help them keep closer tabs on their most prized assets: “Money mules,” individuals willingly or unwittingly recruited to help fraudsters launder stolen funds. It seems that at least one mule recruitment gang employs custom software to spy on new recruits.
Last month, I heard from a reader in North Carolina named John who’d been roped into working for a company that claimed to be in the digital concierge and outsourcing business. John became suspicious that he was involved in something shady when they told him he should expect a transfer of nearly $10,000 to the personal bank account that he’d provided to his erstwhile employer in order to eventually receive a paycheck.
