Funny The Daily Show with Jon Stewart

There is nothing to prosecute Jon Stewart for. It's not selective prosecution.

 

You said what Jon Stewart did was fraud. Saying it's selective prosecution because JS isn't getting prosecuted kills any point you're trying to make.

 

People get prosecuted for financial crimes all the time.

Here are some of the cases the same division that went after Trump also went after last year.

Civil Investigations Unit Activities The attorneys and staff of CIU investigate and, where appropriate, bring enforcement actions with respect to violations of the New York Financial Services Law, Banking Law, and Insurance Law, as well as the regulations promulgated thereunder, including the Department’s cybersecurity, virtual currency, and transaction monitoring regulations. Discussed below are some of CIU’s investigations, initiatives, and other activities conducted in 2023.

Coinbase, Inc.
In January 2023, the Department entered into a consent order with Coinbase, Inc. (“Coinbase”) for compliance failures that resulted in violations of the New York Banking Law and the Department’s Virtual Currency, Money Transmitter, Transaction Monitoring, and Cybersecurity Regulations. These failures made the Coinbase platform vulnerable to criminal conduct, including, among other things, fraud, money laundering, child sexual abuse material-related activity, and narcotics trafficking. Pursuant to the settlement, Coinbase agreed to pay a $50 million penalty and committed to investing an additional $50 million over the next two years to improve its compliance function. Coinbase also agreed to retain an independent monitor to review, report on, and assist Coinbase in remediating the compliance deficiencies identified during the Department’s investigation. The Department found that, among other things, Coinbase’s Bank Secrecy Act/Anti-Money Laundering (“BSA/AML”) program — including its Know Your Customer/Customer Due Diligence (“KYC/CDD”) procedures, transaction monitoring system (“TMS”), suspicious activity reporting, and sanctions compliance systems — were inadequate. For example, Coinbase’s KYC/CDD program, both as written and as implemented, treated customer onboarding requirements as a simple box-checking exercise and failed to conduct appropriate due diligence or monitoring. Additionally, Coinbase was unable to keep pace with the growth in the volume of alerts generated by its TMS, resulting in a significant and growing backlog of over 4 100,000 unreviewed transaction monitoring alerts by late 2021. As uninvestigated TMS alerts languished for months in the backlog, Coinbase routinely failed to timely investigate and file Suspicious Activity Reports (“SARs”), as required by law. The Department’s investigation found numerous examples of SARs filed months after the suspicious activity was first known to Coinbase. Finally, Coinbase failed to timely report a cyber event as required by the Department’s Cybersecurity Regulation.

BitPay, Inc.
In March 2023, the Department entered into a consent order with BitPay, Inc. (“BitPay”) to address violations of the Department’s Cybersecurity and Virtual Currency Regulations. Pursuant to the settlement, BitPay agreed to pay a $1 million penalty, as well as undertake certain remedial measures to address the findings in the consent order. The Department’s investigation into BitPay found deficiencies in the company’s cybersecurity program, namely that BitPay failed to conduct periodic cybersecurity risk assessments, with the only risk assessment conducted by the company completed in March of 2021. As a result, BitPay operated its cybersecurity program without being sufficiently informed as to the risks facing its information systems. Further, BitPay failed to formally designate a Chief Information Security Officer until May 2022, and there was no reporting to the Board of Directors regarding the cybersecurity program and the material cybersecurity risks facing BitPay. The Department also identified certain deficiencies related to BitPay’s BSA/AML program. Specifically, BitPay did not have sufficient internal controls, policies, and procedures in place to ensure robust oversight of its AML program, did not have sufficient independent testing of its transaction monitoring systems to provide assurance that the system operated as intended, and failed to establish robust practices to ensure compliance with application sanctions.

CFCU Community Credit Union
In April 2023, the Department entered into a consent order with CFCU Community Credit Union (“CFCU”) for failing to comply with the federal Servicemembers Civil Relief Act (“SCRA”) and New York Military Law (“NY MIL”). Pursuant to the agreement, CFCU agreed to pay $40,825 in restitution to affected customers and a $200,000 penalty to DFS. The Department’s examination of CFCU and a subsequently conducted look back revealed that CFCU had imposed interest charges greater than the permissible 6% on 12 borrowers who were on active duty. In 11 cases, the violation was caused by fees that increased the interest rate above 6%. The Department found that CFCU also wrongfully repossessed two vehicles of active-duty borrowers. Pursuant to the settlement, CFCU remediated the interest rate violations by sending refund checks for overcharged fees and interest to seven borrowers who had paid off their loans, reduced the outstanding principal balance of four loans that were still outstanding as of August 31, 2021, and reduced the charged-off balance of one loan. CFCU paid the two borrowers whose 5 vehicles had been wrongfully repossessed the fair market value at the time of repossession and agreed to contact all relevant credit reporting agencies on behalf of the affected servicemembers to remove the tradelines associated with the repossessions. CFCU enhanced its policies and adopted additional procedures to ensure compliance with the SCRA and NY MIL going forward. The policies and procedures require CFCU to learn whether a borrower facing repossession has joined active-duty military prior to its commencing a repossession and to enhance its corresponding documentation and tracking. CFCU also agreed to provide all appropriate personnel, including the credit union’s asset recovery unit, with annual training on SCRA and NY MIL compliance.

bitFlyer USA, Inc.
In May 2023, the Department reached a settlement with bitFlyer USA, Inc. (“bitFlyer USA”), a virtual currency exchange and custodial wallet provider, for violations of the Department’s Cybersecurity and Virtual Currency Regulations. bitFlyer USA agreed to pay a $1.2 million penalty and undertake significant remediation of its cybersecurity program. The supervisory examinations conducted in 2018 and 2020 and subsequent investigation of bitFlyer USA revealed failures to implement an adequate cybersecurity program, in violation of the Department’s Virtual Currency and Cybersecurity Regulations. Specifically, bitFlyer USA failed to perform periodic assessments of internal and external cybersecurity risks and threats, improperly relied on an information technology audit in place of a cybersecurity risk assessment, and failed to implement a cybersecurity program designed to protect electronic systems and information stored on those systems from unauthorized access, use, or other malicious acts, because its written cybersecurity policy was not approved by the board of directors or tailored to its organizational structure and associated risks. Pursuant to the consent order, bitFlyer USA performed a comprehensive review of its current compliance programs with respect to the Virtual Currency and Cybersecurity Regulations. Based on this review, a remediation plan was designed to bring bitFlyer USA into compliance by December 31, 2023. Pursuant to the remediation plan, bitFlyer USA continues to provide quarterly progress reports to DFS.

OneMain Financial Group, LLC
In May 2023, the Department entered into a consent order with OneMain Financial Group, LLC (“OneMain”) for failing to comply with DFS’s Cybersecurity Regulation. Pursuant to the settlement, OneMain agreed to pay a $4.25 million penalty and engage in corrective actions designed to bring the company into compliance. The Department’s investigation found, among other things, that OneMain had failed to effectively manage user access privileges by manually conducting privilege access reviews, which introduced a high risk of human error unacceptable for its network. OneMain also permitted local administrative users to share accounts, compromising the ability to identify 6 malicious actors. Those accounts still used the default password provided by OneMain at the time of user onboarding, increasing the risk of unauthorized access. The Department’s investigation further found that OneMain’s application security policy lacked a formalized methodology to provide for all phases of the company’s software development life cycle. The company used a non-formalized project administration framework it had developed in-house that failed to address certain key software development life cycle phases, which led to increased vulnerability to cybersecurity events. Additionally, although OneMain has a third-party vendor management policy that requires each of its vendors to undergo an assessment to determine the vendor’s risk rating and the appropriate level of due diligence OneMain should perform on the vendor, the company did not timely conduct due diligence for certain high- and medium-risk vendors, effectively rendering such risk ratings moot. OneMain further failed to appropriately adjust the risk scores of several vendors after the occurrence of multiple cybersecurity events precipitated by the vendors’ improper handling of NPI and poor cybersecurity controls. As part of the settlement, OneMain agreed to engage in remediation efforts, reports of which are currently under review by the Department.

Shinhan Bank America
On September 29, 2023, the Department announced a settlement with Shinhan Bank America (“Shinhan”) under which the bank agreed to pay a $10 million penalty pursuant to a consent order. The consent order resolved the Department’s longstanding investigation into repeated violations of BSA/AML requirements and New York law. Specifically, the Department found that Shinhan’s transaction monitoring and BSA/AML programs suffered from material deficiencies, and the bank neglected to remediate these issues over a period of years. Despite prior enforcement actions by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (“FDIC”) in 2017 and the Department in 2020, Shinhan failed to address weaknesses and unsafe and unsound conditions. The consent order further required Shinhan to create a written plan, acceptable to the Department, detailing enhancements to compliance policies and procedures, suspicious activity monitoring and reporting, and customer due diligence requirements. The Department coordinated this investigation with the FDIC and the U.S. Treasury Department’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (“FinCEN”).

Metropolitan Commercial Bank
In October 2023, DFS entered into a consent order with Metropolitan Commercial Bank (“Metropolitan”), under which the bank agreed to pay a $15 million penalty. The agreement followed an investigation into the bank’s oversight of one of its third-party program managers responsible for the issuance of prepaid debit cards. In early January 2020, fraud actors began to open debit card accounts with fraudulently obtained personal identifying information. These fraudulent accounts were then used to misdirect payroll payments and government benefits to the fraud actors. Amid the COVID-19 pandemic, with the issuance of expanded unemployment insurance benefits for millions of Americans, the fraud worsened. Despite its knowledge of the ongoing problem, Metropolitan failed to remedy the issues and instead allowed new accounts to be opened. This inaction led to more than $300 million in pandemic unemployment benefits being misdirected to the accounts of fraud actors. In addition 8 to the civil monetary penalty, Metropolitan agreed to create a written plan detailing enhancements to its oversight of third-party program managers.

Payoneer, Inc.
In November 2023, DFS entered into a consent order with Payoneer, Inc. (“Payoneer”) to resolve the Department’s investigation into payments processed by the company in apparent violation of sanctions imposed by the U.S. Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (“OFAC”). Payoneer is licensed by DFS to operate as a money transmission business in New York State and, as such, is required by regulation to ensure that its transactions comply with OFAC’s requirements. The Department found that although Payoneer had policies and procedures prohibiting transactions of parties in sanctioned locations, the company’s sanctions compliance program had substantial weaknesses. These compliance control breakdowns enabled individuals in sanctioned countries and regions, including Iran, Sudan, and Syria, to engage in nearly $800,000 worth of illegal transactions. In addition to paying a penalty of $1.25 million, Payoneer voluntarily improved and strengthened its OFAC compliance program, including providing enhanced training for employees and dedicating increased resources to sanctions compliance.

First American Title Insurance Company
In November 2023, the Department finalized a settlement with First American Title Insurance Company (“First American”). The settlement resolved administrative charges brought by the Department in July 2020 related to a cybersecurity incident experienced at First American in May 2019. The Department’s investigation revealed that a vulnerability in First American’s in-house developed application, EaglePro, resulted in the exposure of hundreds of millions of title-related documents, containing consumer Nonpublic Information (“NPI”). First American’s failure to comply with its own internal cybersecurity policies and procedures, as well as its failure to 9 implement sufficient access controls to prevent unauthorized users to gain access to NPI through EaglePro, constituted a violation of the Department’s Cybersecurity Regulation. Pursuant to the settlement, First American agreed to pay a $1 million penalty and submit a detailed overview of the remediation the company has undertaken in the wake of the May 2019 cybersecurity incident.

https://www.dfs.ny.gov/system/files...-fraud-enforcement-division-annual-report.pdf

 

Yes, fraud is prosecuted from time to time.

FINALLY, YOU GET IT!

 

As is the square footage, apparently. Square footage is, well, you know, that's just, like, your opinion, man.

barfo

 

If you cheated massively on your taxes - like claimed a $50M refund this year - don't you think you might attract the attention of the IRS?

And if you did that year after year, wouldn't that make it even more likely that you'd get busted?

And when you are caught, do you think you won't suffer any consequences? You could, after all, tell the IRS that 'everyone does it'.

Trump isn't being selectively prosecuted, he's being prosecuted because he's so fucking flagrantly criminal it's impossible to ignore.

I'm not the one defending a serial fraudster. You might have principles, but they appear to be corrupted by your partisanship.

barfo

 

It's funny at the end of the day, you drag out the old 'bank didn't mind being defrauded' defense.

barfo

 

I know that. I used the IRS because you have the opportunity to cheat on your taxes, you don't have the opportunity to commit the type of real estate fraud that Trump did.

barfo