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Frank tried this. They purchased lists of student emails from ASL Marketing and Enformion to turn over to JPM. Turns out that the majority of those email addres

Frank tried this. They purchased lists of student emails from ASL Marketing and Enformion to turn over to JPM. Turns out that the majority of those email addresses were nonfunctional, but even more importantly, even those legitimate email addresses just wouldn't open the emails (because presumably since those users had no previous relationship with Frank or JPM they were just treated as spam). That's what made JPM suspicious. Those emails had an open rate that was > an order of magnitude lower than previous JPM email campaigns.

RC_ITR 4y ago
Yeah but this [0] exists and a good fraudster goes “Hey, I’m an up and coming entrepreneur who is about to cash out and I want to give out some scholarships. Can my foundation buy access to your list please?” Then you spend like $1mn tops on the actual best list of high school emails in the country, give out like $5mn in actual scholarships, and get unlimited love and attention from the kids whose life you changed. Plus you stay rich and don’t go to jail. Hell, maybe you even subtly market Frank in the scholarship emails (Hi, I’m the founder of Frank and want to give back to students more directly…) and your user base actually grows! [0]* Student Search Service™ Student Search Service is a free, optional service that helps students start a conversation with colleges and scholarship organizations. If students choose to participate in Student Search Service, they agree to share their name, address, college interest, and Student Data Questionnaire responses with colleges, universities, and nonprofit scholarship and educational programs. This information is used for recruitment, scholarship opportunities, and college planning outreach. College Board does not sell student information; however, qualified colleges, universities, nonprofit scholarship services, and nonprofit educational organizations do pay a license fee to use this information to recruit students and provide opportunities in connection with educational or scholarship programs. These license fees are reinvested in our nonprofit mission. For example, these organizations must sign a strict license agreement that outlines how student information can be used. College Board maintains a direct relationship with, and oversight of, all organizations using this student information and monitors the use of student information by licensed organizations. Students can opt out of Student Search Service at any time. More information about Student Search Service.*
dmix 4y ago
They did buy such a DB but the indictment said they didn't get it in time to add the real emails to their fake list. So that's not exactly accurate. Those email lists are real but they are still mostly useless.

RC_ITR 4y ago

Yeah but this [0] exists and a good fraudster goes “Hey, I’m an up and coming entrepreneur who is about to cash out and I want to give out some scholarships. Can my foundation buy access to your list please?” Then you spend like $1mn tops on the actual best list of high school emails in the country, give out like $5mn in actual scholarships, and get unlimited love and attention from the kids whose life you changed. Plus you stay rich and don’t go to jail. Hell, maybe you even subtly market Frank in the scholarship emails (Hi, I’m the founder of Frank and want to give back to students more directly…) and your user base actually grows! [0]* Student Search Service™ Student Search Service is a free, optional service that helps students start a conversation with colleges and scholarship organizations. If students choose to participate in Student Search Service, they agree to share their name, address, college interest, and Student Data Questionnaire responses with colleges, universities, and nonprofit scholarship and educational programs. This information is used for recruitment, scholarship opportunities, and college planning outreach. College Board does not sell student information; however, qualified colleges, universities, nonprofit scholarship services, and nonprofit educational organizations do pay a license fee to use this information to recruit students and provide opportunities in connection with educational or scholarship programs. These license fees are reinvested in our nonprofit mission. For example, these organizations must sign a strict license agreement that outlines how student information can be used. College Board maintains a direct relationship with, and oversight of, all organizations using this student information and monitors the use of student information by licensed organizations. Students can opt out of Student Search Service at any time. More information about Student Search Service.*

dmix 4y ago

They did buy such a DB but the indictment said they didn't get it in time to add the real emails to their fake list. So that's not exactly accurate. Those email lists are real but they are still mostly useless.