back to article Mother charged with selling fake Facebook stock

A Wisconsin woman has been charged over claims she tried to sell $1m worth of Facebook shares that she didn't own. Prosecutors said that Marianne Oleson had told friends that she received the shares because her daughter knew Mark Zuckerberg, and managed to persuade a few different people to take the fake stock off her hands. …

COMMENTS

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  1. ItsNotMe
    Facepalm

    Seems to me...

    ...that the dumbasses who BOUGHT the "stock" from her should be arrested for being stupid.

    1. Steven Raith
      FAIL

      Especially the contractor

      Never do favours, never take alternate payment methods, always take hard currency upon completion of the job.

      No exceptions.

      Fucking idiot asked for it, frankly.

  2. Graham Marsden

    "tried to sell $1m worth of Facebook shares that she didn't own"

    Whereas if you do that on the official stock markets it's known as "naked shorting" and is often a legal (if risky and highly disapproved of) method of making lots of money!

    1. Charlie Clark Silver badge

      Who says it's disapproved of? If that were the case it wouldn't be allowed, at least over the counter. As for risky: all trades on the stockmarket are risky almost by definition? Still I agree with you in tenor that "naked shorting" is unnecessary.

      1. Anonymous John

        I disapprove of it. So there.

  3. miknik
    Coat

    My bail is $50,000?

    Hmmmm, will you accept Facebook stock?

  4. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Are you kidding me?

    If you're dumb enough to fall for these deals you should get bilked. It is criminal to be this stupid.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Perhaps they're conservatives…?

      http://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.co.uk/2012/02/03/thick_kids_racist/

    2. HeNe

      trust is trust, fraud is fraud

      Her victims presumably knew and trusted her, and she defrauded them.

      "Trust, yet verify" -- an excellent idea, but how?

      I would not accept stock documents in lieu of cash from anyone. Why? Because I have no way of knowing what "legitimate" stock documents look like.

      If I call a broker, and say, "I want to buy 1000 share of Intel stock", how can I verify that after paying the broker, I truly "own" 1000 shares of Intel stock?

      Because "a computer says so"? No. Computers can (and many times, have been) been fradulently manipulated.

      How do I verify that my brokerage company isn't just keeping the money I paid them to buy stocks with?

      How to I verify that my brokerage company isn't raiding my account, and issuing faked account statements?

      How do I verify my bank (or, dishonest employees of the bank) have not raided my accounts and issued faked account statements?

      Answer: I cannot.

      If they're defrauding me, I won't find out about it until I try to pull my money and it's "not there", or I see a headline about "Broker/Bank X Stock/Fraud Scandal".

      I guess it's criminally-stupid to put money in a bank, or to buy stock.

      1. redxine

        Somehow though

        keeping £10,000+ in your home doesn't seem like a rational idea either. Money that's idling and not gaining interest is criminal also! Lucky for us we've got a little insurance to go with banks. The downside to the modern economy is that 97% of all money in the UK are just numbers in a computer. So honestly I'm not surprised at this story.

        Cash is great, but let's be reasonable. The banks aren't out to get you..... mostly.

  5. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    it is only a small difference

    Calm down!

    It is only a small difference between Facebook and Fakebook

  6. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Didn't she think

    the guy who had been working on her house might know where she lived?

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      No

      If he was stupid enough to accept fake stock for all his work AND hand over a further 10K of his own money I doubt she saw issue.

    2. Paul Westerman
      FAIL

      Indeed

      I was wondering what her plan was long term - then I read that she had given some to her daughter for Christmas and concluded that she's just deluded/mental :)

  7. defiler

    Christmas present?

    What tightass give fake stock to her daughter for Christmas? I'm sure she'd much prefer some of the real weed that was being grown...

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