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The Morning Risk Report: More People are Falling Victim to Scams |
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![](http://i2.createsend1.com/ei/d/02/4B5/318/csimport/F.190828.jpg) |
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More people are falling victim to scams in the U.S. than in the past, according to data from the Better Business Bureau. As fraud get more complex, just recognizing the signs has become more difficult.
The rising number of scam reports shows Americans haven’t gotten better at identifying if they are at risk. Scammers these days don’t just prey on naiveté. They excel at identifying vulnerabilities of their victims. Romance scams exploit emotions, disaster-relief scams take advantage of generosity and financial scams tend to profit from our trust of technology.
[Continued below…]
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“From an adversary’s perspective, it’s a very good time to be in cyber crime,” says former CIA technology director Dr. Eric Cole. And while running background checks on traditional financial representatives has been made simple, increased numbers of online transactions, peer-to-peer payments and nontraditional investment strategies can still be the Wild West.
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| From Risk & Compliance Journal |
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Cuomo Chief of Staff Tapped to Lead N.Y. Financial Regulator |
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Linda Lacewell, a former federal prosecutor who has worked for Gov. Andrew Cuomo since he became attorney general in 2007, was nominated to lead the New York Department of Financial Services, Risk & Compliance Journal’s Samuel Rubenfeld reports.
Ms. Lacewell, who currently serves as Mr. Cuomo’s chief of staff, replaces Maria Vullo, who has been the head of DFS since January 2016. Ms. Vullo, also a former aide to Mr. Cuomo, said in a Dec. 19 statement that she would leave the department on Feb. 1.
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![](http://i3.createsend1.com/ei/d/02/4B5/318/csimport/F-1.215725.jpg) |
A data breach at Marriott, the world’s largest hotel chain, is rivaled only by a hack of Yahoo in 2013 and 2014. PHOTO: DANIEL ACKER/BLOOMBERG NEWS
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Marriott Says Hackers Swiped Millions of Passport
Numbers |
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Marriott International Inc. said fewer customers were affected in a massive data breach than initially feared but confirmed hackers had compromised the passport numbers of millions of people in what security analysts describe as a potential foreign-intelligence gold mine.
Marriott disclosed in November that a hack in the reservation database for its Starwood properties may have exposed the information of up to 500 million guests. The company said Friday, though, that about 383 million records was “the upper limit.” That figure includes passport numbers, email addresses and payment-card data of some guests.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation is investigating the hack. U.S. officials familiar with the probe have said they increasingly view China as the leading suspect in the breach, due to forensic clues and Beijing’s history of pilfering American data sets for intelligence purposes.
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Massive Leak Strikes Germany’s Political Class |
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German authorities are investigating the leaking and hacking of personal data belonging to hundreds of politicians and other personalities in one of the country’s largest cyber breaches.
The leaks, which were mainly disseminated through a Twitter account that the company shut down on Friday, included personal data from Chancellor Angela Merkel and President Frank-Walter Steinmeier, government officials said. No sensitive information from the politicians was released and government networks weren’t affected, authorities said. German authorities say they don’t yet know who was responsible for the leaks.
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![](http://i4.createsend1.com/ei/d/02/4B5/318/csimport/f-3.221246.jpg) |
Lion Air pilots during a routine practice session on a Boeing simulator at Angkasa Training Center near Jakarta, Indonesia, in early November. PHOTO: WILLY KURNIAWAN/REUTERS
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Airline Automation Triggers Intensified Debate Over Safety
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The fatal Lion Air crash has revved up debate about the biggest quandary in airline safety: how best to meld increasingly sophisticated computer controls, designed to prevent tragedies, with traditional piloting skills.
Ever-more-powerful cockpit automation and ultrareliable jet engines have contributed to record-low accident rates in recent years. But the accident this past October involving Lion Air Flight 610, which killed 189 people in Indonesia, dramatically highlighted the hazards when automated flight-control features fail or misfire, and pilots aren’t able to respond properly.
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Trade Tensions Take a Toll on China’s Economy |
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China’s economy is slowing faster than expected as Beijing heads into a crucial new round of negotiations with the U.S. over trade. For the past couple of months, senior Chinese officials have sought to play down the impact of U.S.-China trade tensions on the world’s second-largest economy, telling the public the conflict is doing little more than hurting the nation’s stock indexes, making it a good time to buy China again.
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Apple Beware: Samsung’s Great Fall in China Was Swift |
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Apple Inc.’s recently revealed stumble in China is a familiar story for smartphone rival Samsung Electronics Co.
Five years ago, the South Korean technology giant sat atop the Chinese market, selling nearly one of every five devices there. Today, Samsung controls less than 1% of the world’s largest smartphone market. Samsung last month closed one of its two Chinese smartphone factories.
Few expect Apple’s sales decline in China to be as dramatic, but Samsung’s comedown offers a cautionary tale for foreign smartphone makers.
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![](http://i5.createsend1.com/ei/d/02/4B5/318/csimport/f-4.222324.jpg) |
Protesters demanding that PG&E be held accountable for its role in the Camp Fire march outside the utility’s headquarters in San Francisco last month. PHOTO: JUSTIN SULLIVAN/GETTY IMAGES
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PG&E to Shake Up Board as It Responds to California Wildfire
Crisis |
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PG&E Corp. plans to shake up its board as the company responds to concerns that it could face billions of dollars in liabilities related to the recent deadly wildfires in California. The state’s largest utility said it would hire a search firm to find new directors to add “fresh perspective” to the company’s board and bolster its expertise in fire safety and other areas.
The company said it is reviewing “structural options” to implement the changes needed, but it didn’t specify what those options might be. PG&E shares dropped more than 24% after-hours Friday, after Reuters reported that the company was exploring seeking bankruptcy protection for some or all of its business units.
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Governance A Top Executive at Nissan to Take Leave of Absence |
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One of Nissan Motor Co.’s top executives, José Muñoz, is taking a leave of absence, the first shake-up of top management in the wake of the arrest of former Chairman Carlos Ghosn. Mr. Muñoz oversees the business strategy of Nissan’s seven regional and business units, and in April took oversight of the company’s China operations—a key focus area for the Nissan.
But Mr. Muñoz’s performance had come under scrutiny from Chief Executive Hiroto Saikawa, who singled out Nissan’s U.S. strategy to grow market share as a source of the company’s struggles with profitability.
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Activist Investor Starboard Seeks Changes at Dollar Tree |
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Activist investor Starboard Value LP has taken a stake in Dollar Tree Inc. and is pushing the retailer to sell its Family Dollar business and tweak its pricing model, according to people familiar with the matter.
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‘We have to let these great, brilliant companies have the smartest people in the world,’ Mr. Trump said on Friday. PHOTO: MICHAEL CANDELORI/ZUMA PRESS
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Trump Signals Willingness to Negotiate on Skilled Foreign
Workers |
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While the fight over illegal entry into the U.S. has dominated the immigration debate, the Trump administration has also sought curbs on legal immigration over business groups’ objections. President Trump said Friday that he wants to find ways to allow companies to retain top foreign workers, as he made an argument for shifting toward a merit-based immigration system.
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Heavy-Duty Truck Orders Tumbled 43% in December |
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Orders for heavy-duty trucks in North America fell back to the lowest level in 17 months in December as a long surge in fleet expansion that has fueled big factory backlogs ran out of steam.
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The C919, designed by China’s Comac, has about 1,000 orders from Chinese airlines. PHOTO: DING TING/ZUMA PRESS
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How China Could Challenge the Boeing-Airbus Duopoly |
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Boeing and Airbus are close to neutralizing all threats to their duopoly—with one exception. In time, a Chinese challenger could have the scale necessary to compete in the $190 billion commercial aviation market.
Boeing is in talks to buy an 80% stake in the commercial aircraft division of Brazilian manufacturer Embraer for $4.2 billion. Boeing’s interest in Embraer is a response to Airbus’ purchase of the 108-to-133 seater CSeries—renamed A220—from Canadian manufacturer Bombardier. If completed, the latest deal would take out the industry’s last small player.
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Early Corporate Adopters Put AI to Strategic Use |
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Buhler Group, the global food and feed processing equipment maker, is using artificial intelligence to analyze rice production at hundreds of facilities world-wide. It's one of the many companies using AI for everything from inspecting rice to helping golfers select the best club for a given shot.
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