Banking giant JPMorgan Chase has begun filing lawsuits against perpetrators of a check fraud that was proliferated through videos on TikTok and other social media platforms.
Popularly known as the “Infinite Money Glitch,” the alleged fraudsters took advantage of an issue with JPMorgan’s ATM terminals that allowed them to draw down cash based on fake checks that would ultimately bounce.
The initial set of four lawsuits sees the bank suing for a sum totaling $661,000, with the largest individual claim at nearly $300,000.
Infinite Money Glitch Explained
Millions of users watched videos during the summer on TikTok and X, formerly Twitter, of people explaining or taking advantage of the so-called Infinite Money Glitch.
It was made possible by an anomaly in JPMorgan’s systems in August that allowed customers to deposit checks at their ATMs and then immediately withdraw the funds in cash.
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This did not give a reasonable time for the checks to clear and, by the time that the fraudulent check eventually bounced, the cash had already been withdrawn.
‘Fraud is a Crime’
While some alleged perpetrators seemingly felt they were merely taking advantage of a glitch in the system, JPMorgan unsurprisingly sees things rather differently.
“Fraud is a crime that impacts everyone and undermines trust in the banking system.” – Drew Pusateri, JPMorgan Chase
The four lawsuits have been brought in federal courts in Houston, Los Angeles, and Miami, Reuters reports, with two individuals and two businesses named as the defendants.
A total of $661,000 in damages is being sought on the basis that the accused parties violated their deposit agreements and that the checks should be deemed forgeries or counterfeit.
The largest sum of money that JPMorgan says was illegally retained was in Houston, where the bank says the alleged fraudster owes $290,939.47. He withdrew the cash over two days after a masked person deposited a check for $335,000.
Social Media Scams and AI Fightback
TikTok and X’s indirect part in the misdemeanors – by providing a platform on which word of the Infinite Money Glitch vulnerability was spread – certainly isn’t the first time that social media has contributed to fraud. Although usually it’s their users who are the victims, not the perpetrators.
The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) released figures last year putting a value of $2.7 billion that had been gathered by social media scammers since 2021. And Facebook scams have dogged the platform and its users more or less since its inception.
But technology and, more specifically, AI is being used to a greater and greater extent in the fight against fraud.
Earlier in the year, Mastercard outlined plans to use AI to curb credit card fraud by “scanning transaction data across billions of cards and millions of merchants at faster rates than previously imagined”.
And the US government recovered $4 billion worth of fraud with AI, using the technology to bolster its detection and prevention rates.
