archkittens's Journal: bank of failmerica has no security on ATMs

so, the other day, my friend tells me he's sold some PSP parts on-line for 3000 USD to some guy, supposedly in Scotland. i cautioned him, reminding him that the last two folks that tried to buy the parts had sent some fake checks. he waited for the check to clear, it did. here's the catch though. bank of America, his checking and savings provider, then issued him an over-withdrawal notice, to the sum of 1.6 million dollars. apparently, the guy who'd sent the check managed to withdraw 800,000 from both my friend's checking and savings account. to make matters worse, the savings account was completely empty (checking had 100 bucks from his last pay check) now for the punchline: it was all supposedly withdrawn from an ATM in California, by the guy who lives in Scotland. we live spitting distance from RTP.

all i have to say on the matter is that A, the guy from "Scotland" is very good at what he does, B, bank of America must be staffed by blind people to not have noticed the incongruence when a human being reviewed the transaction, and C, that 1.6 million dollars isn't going to get put back by my friend, ever.

i wonder if the credit reporting agencies will be dumb enough to mark that against him?