It's easy to track where the money has gone, which means this type of fraud has high risk of getting caught. You need a rube to hold the receiving account and then a money laundering method to get it away from them cleanly, which is all a lot harder.
Just an anecdote that may not be possible now but in the 90's someone emptied my checking account in Austin with a series of a dozen 2000 dollar withdrawals (was about to put down payment on house) to cash via drive through lanes at different branches of my bank in a different city (Houston) with a fake ID in the space of an hour or so, that ID had my name with a different photo, gender and different race (there was a drive through photo of the person).
Yes. I was pretty weirded out when my ATM card was rejected for being locked out of my account, and when I went into the bank when it opened the next day, the teller sent me to talk to a bank official, after a little investigation they compared I think the fax of the photo in drive through to me (I remember seeing the person in the car), and made me sign a document saying I was not involved and would help them prosecute the case if they caught the person who did it, and created a new account for me with my money in it after a few days.
This seems like the most relevant answer. The account debiting the funds will have had a fair amount of due diligence and real people associated with it. Some real person will be left holding the bag when the flood of complaints comes in. Timing it so that you get a fall-guy to open the account, get ACH debit rights, steal the money, and get it out and laundered would be non-trivial. And doing all that in some way where the fall guy can't identify you.
This explains the package manager scams I see in my inbox. I keep fraud, crypto, and purchase scams in folders. It is a bit like collecting spores, molds, and fungus.
Interesting so if you manage to gain control of someone else’s account, you pull up the last check from the richest person you know and pull from their account. Then you use that to fund a crypto account, buy some crypto that can be exchanged on a automated defi exchange and you’re good to go.
