ACATS fraud on the rise as criminals exploit brokerage transfer system

 Regulators are warning about a surge in a type of crime known as ACATS fraud, where thieves use the brokerage industry’s Automated Customer Account Transfer Service to steal investor assets, the New York Times reported Friday. The system, designed to quickly move money between firms, has become a weak link in financial security because it emphasizes speed over fraud detection.

Criminals typically open new accounts online with stolen personal details, then request transfers from legitimate brokerage accounts through ACATS. Because firms have only a short window to confirm account information, transfers can be completed within days -- often without the customer realizing until it’s too late.

“The ACATS process was designed for speed, and doesn’t really have good fraud controls in place,” Gavin Holland, a financial crimes expert at SAS, told the newspaper.

One recent case shows how easily it can happen. Tien Tran, a California resident who manages his family’s retirement accounts, logged into his wife’s Roth IRA at Vanguard and found that half the holdings had disappeared. Days earlier, a fraudster had opened two Merrill Edge accounts in his wife’s name and initiated a transfer of assets from Vanguard. Luckily, the money had not yet been withdrawn; both Vanguard and Merrill froze the accounts.

“I was lucky it happened when I was at home and I caught it right away,” Tran said to the Times. His wife’s funds were restored within a week.

The incident left the couple unsettled. They never received a detailed explanation of how the impostor obtained account details, and Tran worried what might have happened if they had been traveling. He has since filed complaints with local police and FINRA, which oversees brokerages.

Experts say investors should take proactive steps: enable transaction alerts, use two-factor authentication, guard account numbers and pay close attention to any unexpected mail from financial institutions. What looks like a routine solicitation may in fact be a notice that an account has been opened in your name.

“It’s scary,” Tran said to the Times. “It can happen to anyone.”

https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/personalfinance/acats-fraud-on-the-rise-as-criminals-exploit-brokerage-transfer-system/ar-AA1NRvQD

OpenAI seeks to monetize Sora and hand more controls to rights holders

 

• OpenAI appears to be shifting its stance on the use of copyright material in its video tool, Sora.

• The app has been flooded with clips featuring famous characters since its launch this week.

• Sam Altman now says OpenAI will give rights holders more control over the use of their material.

At ease, Hollywood.

OpenAI may be changing its tune about the use of copyright materials in its video-generation tool, Sora.

Since launching earlier this week, the new Sora 2 app — which allows users to generate short AI videos from text prompts — has been flooded with clips featuring well-known animated characters and big brands, sparking warnings from legal experts over potential copyright lawsuits.

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has now outlined changes that would give rights holders more control over the use of their intellectual property on the platform, which was the No. 1 free app on the Apple App Store on Friday.

In a blog post, Altman said the company had been "taking feedback" from rights holders and that it would now provide them with "more granular control over generation of characters, similar to the opt-in model for likeness but with additional controls."

"We are hearing from a lot of rightsholders who are very excited for this new kind of 'interactive fan fiction' and think this new kind of engagement will accrue a lot of value to them, but want the ability to specify how their characters can be used (including not at all)," he wrote.

Altman added that OpenAI would also need to "somehow make money for video generation."

"We are going to try sharing some of this revenue with rightsholders who want their characters generated by users," he wrote.

The Wall Street Journal reported earlier this week that OpenAI had been advising studios and talent agencies that rightsholders would have to opt out if they did not want their copyright material to appear in videos produced by Sora.

The "opt-out" model would mean intellectual property owners such as film studios would have to explicitly ask the ChatGPT maker not to include their characters in clips produced on the platform, the report said.

Business Insider's Peter Kafka wrote earlier this week that the "laborious" opt-out method for Sora is a questionable interpretation of current copyright law.

"All of which means OpenAI seems to be trying to rewrite copyright law, on the fly: Your stuff is our stuff, for free — unless you tell us otherwise," Kafka wrote.

This isn't the first time Altman and OpenAI have butted heads with artists.

In 2024, actor Scarlett Johansson said she was "shocked" and "angered" after the company released a voice for a new chatbot model that sounded "eerily similar" to her own.

Johansson said she had previously declined an offer from Altman to voice ChatGPT. In a statement at the time, Altman said the voice was "not Scarlett Johansson's, and it was never intended to resemble hers."

OpenAI faced more copyright scrutiny this year after introducing a feature in ChatGPT that allowed users to create images in the style of Studio Ghibli.

Users once again bombarded the platform with requests for "Ghiblified" images, igniting a fierce debate over whether OpenAI was unfairly using the work of Studio Ghibli cofounder Hayao Miyazaki.

OpenAI is also facing copyright lawsuits from several prominent media outlets and authors, including The New York Times, George RR Martin, and John Grisham.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/openai-appears-walking-back-sora-164027129.html

Sports-Betting Stocks Face Growing Threat From Prediction Rivals

 

Stock traders are making a clear prediction about prediction markets: They’re fast becoming the next big thing for online gambling.

That speculation raced across Wall Street this week after Robinhood Markets Inc. — which played a pivotal role in unleashing the pandemic’s day-trading frenzy — and the exchange Kalshi reported that prediction markets wagers are surging at a rapid pace. Robinhood, which has a partnership with Kalshi to offer wagers on everything from football games to political races and other everyday events, saw more than 2 billion prediction contracts trade in the third quarter alone.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-10-04/sports-betting-stocks-face-growing-threat-from-prediction-rivals

The Unholy Alliance Between Progressives and the Health Insurance Industrial Complex

 Our Capitol Hill sources tell us that the sinister forces behind what they call an “all-out lobbying blitz” to extend supersized “emergency” and “temporary” COVID subsidies under Biden, are the insurance companies. They are the force working alongside Chuck Schumer in his government shutdown ploy to add back into the budget as much as $1 trillion in budget savings from the Big Beautiful Bill.

Why? Obamacare subsidies and Medicaid expansions haven’t done much if anything to improve the nation’s health, but they have made the health insurers like Blue Cross and United Health rich with taxpayer dollars. The value of health insurance stocks rose by multiple times faster than the overall stock market in the 15 years since Obamacare passed in 2010 – and jumped even more since Biden’s COVID subsidies were lavished on top.

The plan is to pressure Republicans into caving to their demand for $30 billion a year in extra, additional subsidies that go directly into insurance company bank accounts.

Our friend Brian Blase of the Paragon Health Institute has shown that the alleged coverage expansion is almost entirely from people who pay exactly $0 in premiums – so virtually the entire government benefit goes to the insurers.

The irony is that the greedy insurers are in bed with the very same liberals like Bernie Sanders whose ultimate goal is to put the insurers out of business with a single payer government-run system. It’s hard to see how that could be much worse than what we have right now, which is bankrupting the country for worse health outcomes while enriching the insurers.

https://committeetounleashprosperity.com/hotlines/the-unholy-alliance-between-progressives-and-the-health-insurance-industrial-complex/

Stop the Health Insurers' Raid on the Treasury

by Stephen Moore 

No one likes insurance companies -- trying to get them to pay a claim is like wrenching a bone out of a dog's clenched teeth -- and now we have another reason to hold them in low regard. The biggest advocate for blowing another $1 trillion hole in the federal budget is the health insurance lobby.

The giant insurance companies -- including UnitedHealthcare, Blue Cross Blue Shield and Humana are leading what Capitol Hill sources describe as "an unprecedented lobbying blitz to restore hundreds of billions in taxpayer-funded Obamacare and Medicare Advantage subsidies."

Brian Blase, a longtime health care expert who worked in the Trump White House, calculates that most of the reimbursement money wouldn't financially benefit patients. The premium subsidies would mostly go straight into the bank accounts of the mega insurers.

The dirty little secret of the health care system since Obamacare was enacted back in 2010 is that the big jackpot winner has been the insurance industry. Their stock has risen roughly four times faster than average for the stock indexes.

By some estimates, this budgetary money grab is worth $30 billion to $50 billion to the insurance lobby.

This raises the question of whether most health insurance spending is really needed at all. If every American simply had a catastrophic coverage plan that would avoid families going bankrupt due to cancer or a terrible accident, we could simply pay our routine health bills the way we pay for rent or groceries -- and then cut out the insurance middleman.

Patients would shop around for the lowest prices, and health insurance would be like home fire insurance: there to aid families in an emergency.

Instead, the insurance companies are adding hundreds of billions of extraneous profits out of the health care system because Americans are over-insured.

Ironically, when Obamacare was originally hatched back in 2010, opponents, including many of your loyal Unleash Prosperity editors, warned that the endgame was a single-payer government-run system that eliminates the private insurance industry middleman. That's exactly the outcome the $3 trillion health care system is barreling toward.

But sooner rather than later, the Bernie Sanders Democrats are going to make their case that the vulturous insurance lobby is an unnecessary trillion-dollar expense to the health care chain.

If Democrats and Republicans can agree on anything, it's that all Americans would be richer and healthier without this health insurance scam.

https://townhall.com/columnists/stephenmoore/2025/09/30/stop-the-health-insurers-raid-on-the-treasury-n2664225

Gradient Ventures said to spin out of Google

 Artificial intelligence venture company Gradient Ventures spun out from Google in order to better position itself to close deals, The Wall Street Journal reported on Friday, citing persons familiar with the matter.

The firm's principals wanted Gradient to become a completely autonomous company because several startup founders are reluctant to accept funding from strategic investors, as they are worried about possible competition, the sources added.

According to a regulatory filing, Gradient Ventures is currently run by a new management firm. Google is one of several limited partners funding the venture fund while Zach Bratun-Glennon and Darian Shirazi remain managing partners of Gradient. Google founded Gradient Ventures in 2017 for technical mentorship for early-stage startups focused on artificial intelligence.

https://breakingthenews.net/Article/Gradient-Ventures-said-to-spin-out-of-Google/64924229

NYC police union urges ouster of ‘anti-cop’ Mamdani-esque Civilian Complaint Review Board chair

 The “anti-cop” head of the agency that oversees NYPD discipline stands lockstep with anti-police mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani — and should be fired, NYC’s largest police union said.

Since Mohammed Khalid took over as interim chair of the CCRB in December, he’s voted against cops in 95% of substantiated allegations, the Police Benevolent Association said. In September, he voted against the officers 100%, according to the union.

And since he’s been at the helm, the agency has rubber-stamped 97% of investigative decisions – or 616 out of 636 allegations against cops — the union said.

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The head of the city’s largest police union is calling for the interim chair of the CCRB to step down.Christopher Sadowski

“With his blatantly biased voting record and dangerous plan to strip away the Police Commissioner’s authority, Dr. Khalid has turned out to be just another anti-cop wolf in sheep’s clothing,” said PBA President Patrick Hendry. 

Khalid, a Staten Island dentist, said during his confirmation that the public should “respect the NYPD” and that his community had “a very good relationship with the police department.” 

But that’s not how he has been operating, the union said.

“He and his fellow radicals on the CCRB board are driving good cops away from the NYPD and putting every New York City neighborhood at risk,” Hendry said. “He must be removed from the interim chair position.”

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Civilian Complaint Review Board Interim Chairman Mohammed Khalid was appointed to the top job by Mayor Eric Adams.nyc.gov

The CCRB investigators probe complaints against officers and find them substantiated or unsubstantiated. The board members, including Khalid, then vote on whether to approve those findings. The board can also recommend administrative penalties, such as a loss of vacation days, and or retraining.

The board sends its findings and a disciplinary recommendation to the police commissioner, who has the final authority to decide what, if any, punishment should be imposed.

The union also called out Khalid for his radical position on giving the CCRB final authority on cop discipline. Currently, the police commissioner makes the final decision on penalties.

During a City Council hearing last week, Khalid called for CCRB to have the last word, saying “We are a tiger, but we don’t have the teeth.”

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Police Benevolent Association President Patrick Hendry is calling for the interim CCRB chief’s removal.Luiz C. Ribeiro for New York Post

In one recent case, Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch went against the CCRB and refused to fire Lt. Jonathan Rivera, who fatally shot unarmed ex-con Allan Feliz in the Bronx in 2019. Rivera opened fire during a car stop to prevent Feliz, 31, from mowing down a fellow officer, she argued.

One 41-year-old cop told The Post the CCRB cleared him of a use of force allegation during an arrest this year but found that he failed to activate his body-worn camera, leaving a black mark on his record, he said.

That makes cops “hesitant to do the job,” said the officer, who asked to remain anonymous.

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Allan Feliz (pictured with his infant son) was shot by the NYPD in the Bronx during a traffic stop.Brigitte Stelzer/copyphoto
“If they do it right, they’re still going to get complaints about it,” he said of officers. “This guy gets collared and has cocaine on him, but still makes a complaint.”

CCRB spokesman Dakota Gardner said the agency “conducts rigorous investigations” into the complaints it receives.

“That these conclusions are often aligned with the investigator’s recommendation shows just how clear the evidence is in many of the cases the board substantiates,” he said. “Every member of the board takes their responsibility to impartially follow the facts and the law extremely seriously, and any suggestion otherwise is patently false.”

https://nypost.com/2025/10/04/us-news/pba-calls-chairman-of-anti-cop-complaint-board-blatantly-biased/