Video download link | md5sum 48e9263394120bccc9b1a1adaaa76670
Action Fraud Bots
Creative Commons Attribution-No Derivative Works 4.0

Summary: Sirius ‘Open Source’ stole money from its own staff and British police isn’t doing anything on the matter (despite all the evidence being complete and unambiguous), so one is left with the impression that British businesses can basically get away with serious crimes, even against their own workers

TODAY I opened my E-mail client and I was greeted by a message or presented with a rather familiar message, which at first I thought was sent in error — or perhaps wrongly dated — because it closely resembled something that I had already received a month ago. As it turns out, Action Fraud operates a bit like a “bot”; instead of treating crime reports like reports of a crime (fraud) they seem to be treating them a bit like statistics and nothing suggests they’ve even looked into the report. They just waited a month before issuing a template response, basically telling something that cannot be true, as the video above explains. The troubling thing is, this signals to anyone in the UK (employers in particular) that pension fraud or embezzlement is OK because law enforcement agencies won’t even bother looking into complaints, even when the multiple UK victims and multiple UK perpetrator are all in the UK (no need to cooperate or work with entities outside the country).

I was going to phone Monday (after the Friday call fell on deaf ears^*) but sent on the weekend — both outside working days and outside working hours — was a seemingly automated message. Despite all evidence provided, there’s nothing to suggest anyone even looked into it and the message was almost identical to the first, hence akin to an automated reply, timed for 28 days after the report got filed. This is quite likely a very common modus operandi, basically programmed and wired into the system. This sort of gaslighting will shatter faith in the system of justice and accountability nationwide.

Reporting this or referring this to the ombudsman might not be practical, but at least we have real proof (as actual victims of a crime) that the police is failing taxpayers who pay cops’ salaries while protecting the abusers, who are cheating on their taxes (there’s a separate complaint already with HMRC).

This is the message sent to me a month ago, as not merely a complainant but one victim among several:

RE: [redacted]

Dear Mr schestowitz,

I am sorry to hear you have been a victim of crime. Thank you for taking the time to report to Action Fraud. Your report has been sent to the National Fraud Intelligence Bureau (NFIB) for review.

Experts at the NFIB will examine the information you provide. Where possible, the information is also matched against other available data in order to enrich and corroborate the details of the fraud. An assessment will be made as to whether there are viable lines of enquiry that would enable a law enforcement body, such as the police service, to investigate. The NFIB aim to provide you with an update on your report within 28 days.

Please be assured that by contacting us you are giving the police vital information they need to protect you and others. The information you have provided may be used to disrupt criminal activity and inform prevention advice and campaigns.

You should keep safe any evidence which you feel may be important. We continuously assess the content of individual and linked crime reports, if you set up an online account, you can use this to add additional information.

If you have any queries regarding this letter please visit www.actionfraud.police.uk/FAQ. If you would like more information on how to protect yourself from fraud and cyber crime, please see the guidance at www.actionfraud.police.uk/support_for_you.

We value your feedback, please visit this link and complete the survey:
www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/CSATREP

Yours sincerely,

Head of Action Fraud

For real-time alerts and prevention advice follow Action Fraud https://www.facebook.com/actionfraud/”actionfraud” or https://twitter.com/actionfrauduk “actionfrauduk”

Compare this text to what they sent hours ago (weekend outside working hours; probably 100% automated):

RE: [redacted]

Dear Mr schestowitz,

I am sorry to hear you have been a victim of crime. Thank you for taking the time to report to Action Fraud. Your report has been sent to the National Fraud Intelligence Bureau (NFIB) for review.

Experts at the NFIB examine the information you provide. Where possible, the information is also matched against other available data in order to enrich and corroborate the details of the fraud. The NFIB assess whether there are viable lines of enquiry that would enable a law enforcement body, such as the police service, to investigate.

On this occasion, based on the information currently available, it has not been possible to identify a line of enquiry which a law enforcement organisation in the United Kingdom could pursue.

Registered users of our service have the opportunity to update their report, so if you have additional information about your crime which you believe could change the assessment, please log in to your account and submit that information. We continuously assess the content of individual and linked crime reports; in the event that a line of enquiry is identified we will provide you with an update.

Please be assured that by contacting us you are giving the police vital information that they need to protect you and others. The information you have provided may be used to disrupt criminal activity and inform prevention advice and campaigns.

If you have any queries regarding this letter please visit www.actionfraud.police.uk/FAQ. If you would like more information on how to protect yourself from fraud and cyber crime, please see the guidance at www.actionfraud.police.uk/support_for_you.

Thank you for taking the time to report and helping us to make the UK a safer place.

We value your feedback, please visit this link and complete the survey:
www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/CSAT28D

Yours sincerely,

Head of NFIB

Notice how many of the paragraphs are identical (the first and second messages are similar). Is this the best a “civilised” police force has to offer^**? This kind of failure by the police seems to have become common knowledge by now and even the police chief in London (the Met) became outspoken about it earlier this month.

Some people might (at this point, in light of such experience) just go like, “what’s the point reporting it to the police? What’s even the point?? What are they gonna do about it???”

This is the hallmark of failing systems, including justice systems designed to selectively enforce the law for the few who hoard lobbyists, lawyers, and even politicians. Cops serve and protect them.

To sum up, in the above case Action Fraud does nothing, does not even indicate it looked into the report. No phonecall, nothing in the post, not even any follow-up questions in the interim. Kafka would have had a short novel about this kind of scenario.
_______
^* When I say that the Friday call fell on deaf ears I mean to say that nobody even heard me at all. I was on the line for about 12 minutes and paid for a call. I never got through the menu system to ever reach an actual human.

^** An anonymous friend agreed with this assessment and further commented: “The two automated messages indicate that 1) they are not doing anything and 2) it probably hasn’t even reached someone’s desk yet.”

Summary: The crimes of Sirius ‘Open Source’ have culminated in two parallel reports; tax fraud was reported as well, as per advice we’ve received, even though that’s not “the” crime but a side issue for a company that became “petty thief” (very big thief)

Maybe it shouldn’t be so surprising. I’ve noticed that almost everyone at Sirius has left already. Very few are left there and they too are looking for a way out (another job). But that wouldn’t be the end of this affair because criminals must be held accountable. They know who they are. They’re managers. They’re also perpetrators.

Many parties knowingly or unknowingly facilitated the crime. One person recently asked me: “Did Standard Life ever send you a statement showing the purported balance of the account or even a statement showing a nil balance?”

No is the short answer, but all of us assumed it was just being silent. All of us.

There is a problem associated with legitimisation of the embezzlement, including letters and payslips that fraudulently claimed pension money had been paid. Every single payslip was a lie. We’re talking about hundreds of payslips.

The Pensions Regulator deals with different scenarios, so it is inapplicable here.

Another person asked: “Do you have legal advice on the topic?”

Well, we went to a lawyer as soon as last year. We agreed it’s not worth suing due to speed and a lack of funds in the company. There would hardly be anything left after 12 months. Litigation is very time-consuming a process. Just 5.5 months after I left the company there are fewer than 5 full-time workers there.

The same person added:

These appear to be the two pertinent questions:

Does the employer owe a debt to you or they owe the money to the pension scheme? This is an important technicality. For example, can they simply discharge their responsibility by giving you a lump sum directly and you can put it in any pension you want.

Defrauding employees and then offering them the money stolen (after getting caught) doesn’t change the fact that fraud took place.

It seems possible that the company tried to ‘pay off’ one victim to keep silent on the matter, but we cannot prove this.

The above person said:

It looks like the pension scheme failed to alert you and failed to alert the regulator. If the employer becomes insolvent, will the incompetence at Standard Life make them liable to cover the loss?

They try to claim not to know us. But that’s a good point. I am still investigating this. The company is not cooperative, so we use another route.

Further to the above:

Tactically, if you make it harder for them to trade, for example, by scaring away other staff and clients, then you also run the risk that they go insolvent and they never pay.

They weren’t going to pay anyway. They refuse to even answer queries, both from my colleagues and myself. They’re technically or legally ‘in hiding’ these days.

As for going insolvent? That seems to be happening regardless.

There’s also this:

In the UK it seems to be very easy for directors of very small companies to drain the bank account and then close the company and open a new company the next day with a very similar name. If the debt is very large then they may try something like that. It is very important for you or Standard Life to file a legal claim before the director begins winding up.

Yes, my legal advisor mentioned this too. It’s important to flag the perpetrators of the crime and hold them accountable. It’s perfectly possible and plausible that they already hide money somewhere. This is classic white-collar crime.

To quote more from the person:

Before you have a claim against them, they can spend down the bank account without consequences.

After the legal claim is registered, if they prioritize payments to other expenses or themselves and put you last then they can face criminal consequences.

They can face these regardless.

If you think they have money in the bank to pay the pension then you could force them into liquidation:

However, if they have other debts too then the remaining funds will be divided up pro-rata. E.g. maybe each debt only gets paid 60% of the real value.

Yes, I heard that too. But that’s £302 for court fees and £2,600 petition deposit (to manage the ‘winding-up’). It says: “You might be able to get the fees back if the company can afford to repay them.”

Going to check where the leads stand. This is work in progress. In the next part we’ll elaborate on the matter and explain how Sirius stained the reputation of “Open Source”. When I joined the company in 2011 it only took the company a few months to defraud me (but I could not prove this until months ago, i.e. in 2023). This went on for over 5 years and neither me nor my colleagues knew. We had mere suspicions.

Video download link | md5sum 4cd628f27bc3a0865875d46519d80701
Nobody to Speak With Today
Creative Commons Attribution-No Derivative Works 4.0

Summary: 28 days ago I reported fraud committed by Sirius ‘Open Source’ against many members of its own staff for more than half a decade; “An assessment will be made as to whether there are viable lines of enquiry that would enable a law enforcement body, such as the police service, to investigate. The NFIB aim to provide you with an update on your report within 28 days,” they said 28 days ago, but no word was received from them. Today I phoned them up for an update and the video above documents the process. The short story is, no human answered the call and I ended up with a silent wait, maybe due to a technical error.

“I am sorry to hear you have been a victim of crime,” said a message to me 28 days ago. “Thank you for taking the time to report to Action Fraud. Your report has been sent to the National Fraud Intelligence Bureau (NFIB) for review.”

Did they get back to me? No, Not yet.

Maybe the coronation spectacle kept them very busy.

As the video hopefully makes evident, their answering system isn’t working. I didn’t even get to speak to a person. I was just muted completely for several minutes (or rather, the other side was perpetually muted, without any indication of any progress whatsoever).

This is especially frustrating as people have been the victims of a crime and there’s nobody to even speak to. Manchester’s police told me I must contact Action Fraud, not them. After 28 days there has been no action, just inaction, and there seems to be nobody to speak to for updates. That’s a lot worse than I expected when initiating the call.

Maybe it’s intentional? To keep down the “plebs” and “chavs”? It’s probably not intentional, but I will try again on Monday to see if I get any luckier, even though these calls aren’t cheap and quite frankly they should have made these ‘freecall’ (0800 and similar), especially if the aim is to protect vulnerable people on shoestring budget. Making such a process this slow would result in fatigue, frustration, and in turn learned helplessness. Curiously enough they present options (in the voice menus) insinuating that their target callers are business and organisations.

Having a police unit that claims to be doing something without actually doing it (or improperly doing it) is a matter of saving face or ticking the “right box”. Action is needed, not automated messages and robots on a telephone line.

Video download link | md5sum 0f02dc3bfb57e85b11051d8d4f2e571d
Serve and Protect Kings?
Creative Commons Attribution-No Derivative Works 4.0

Summary: The response from the police (or lack thereof) is a testament or a sign of a defunct system, wherein committing crimes against the vulnerable might be OK; cops don’t prioritise such cases

TODAY, Thursday, is two days before the self-imposed soft deadline of British police. Less than 30 hours from now they’re supposed to have already looked into the report of crimes by Sirius ‘Open Source’. The evidence is extensive, the language used is polite, and all the correct procedures were followed when the report got filed.

So what’s taking so long?

So far I’ve received no letter, no phonecall, and no E-mail. Imagine being in a situation where enforcement is so urgent that it’s a life-or-death situation. In this case, the matter is urgent as soon there will be no company left to enforce against.

The video above goes through this latest part in a series. If there’s a point to be made here, it’s that the police is unfit for purpose when it comes to white-collar crimes. When it comes to fraud, Action Fraud exists to protect the rich and powerful people from the “hackers” and scammers, but it won’t protect ordinary citizens from rich and powerful corporations.

On Friday I intend to phone them asking for updates. But I won’t get my hopes too high, based on past experiences. The likely outcome is, they will say they still sit on it and need more time. Remember that these people are receiving their salaries from taxpayers. Who are they protecting? The rich tax evaders, who aren’t even contributing much to the budget of the police?

Summary: The crimes of Sirius ‘Open Source’ — crimes that had many victims — don’t seem to interest the police enough to act fast (we expected this all along); as its 28-day time window approaches we revisit the matter and discuss some more

ABOUT four weeks ago I contacted the police and filed a report about Sirius fraud. It was perfectly factual, with no gaps in knowledge left to fill (as I had received formal documentation from the original sources after months of ordeals, mostly trying hard to get them to admit the issue and write official letters). All the witnesses were ready to testify and answer additional questions.

Police is in no rush to act. Cops would be involved if someone’s life was at immediate risk, but that’s about it. They drag their heels, just like pension providers do. Months ago I learn from a friend, a professor who worked here, that his female partner got punched in the face and despite the cops having CCTV footage of the incident and plate number (of the car in question) — in other words everything needed to summon the perpetrator of assault and convict her — the cops chose to do nothing, not even prosecute. See, here in Manchester it has become normal; if something gets damaged or stolen they typically just ask, “do you have insurance?” They don’t want to get involved. They might open a case, give you a number, and then add it to the tally, eventually generating some detailed statistics for taxpayers while asking for implicit consent to close the case (without resolution).

They said they aimed to make progress within 28 days. Well, early this coming Saturday it’ll be 28 days, so I plan to call them tomorrow afternoon and ask about progress. And no, don’t bother to put me down, I’m not expecting much to happen. With my low expectations, not due to the crime not being severe “enough” but the police not being effective enough (from personal experience), I all along expected many delays, little action etc. I had already prepared actions to come after police inaction. There are 5 steps to come after that, but we’re keeping them close to our chest for now. By the end of this series we hope to make it crystal clear that the system for accountability in the UK is not functioning, to put it mildly and politely. The same is true in most countries outside the UK, but we cannot put those to the test (for obvious reasons).

Let me explain the situation very simply, as this subject has been preying on my mind a lot lately, also in light of the EU and the EPO pushing an obviously illegal “Unitary Patent”/”Unified Patent Court”, Donald Trump getting away with everything, and various other examples of rich and/or powerful people being above the law.

Allow me to put it like this: Imagine you pay your tax money to the police (a portion of the salary) and you then spend a lot of time — even prepare and make expensive phonecalls — to gather evidence for the police. Months later you report and politely demand action, as the evidence supports the assertion that a serious crime took place and many people are victims of this crime, not just you. You’ve basically done the work cops were supposed to do, but you’re not an enforcer. You wait a month for action, but nothing happens. The cops not taking action basically signals to employers that embezzlement is OK (stealing workers’ money from their salary under a false pretenses of “pension”).

So you’re basically ripped off twice, first for cops who don’t enforce the law and don’t solve crimes and second by the employer. One might say that there’s money stolen by cops who enable these crimes while giving false assurances of “law and order”.

So what’s the point of the police?

They might as well publicly state that embezzlement has been informally legalised by inaction, in which case people need vigilantes to enforce rules or resort to force in case theft was detected.

Would that make us safer?

No, the vigilantes would soon be getting in trouble for “violence” or “sabotage” of rich people’s
“property”. As a reminder, the cops in the UK have emblems like the crown (worn on the helmet); they work for the Monarchy — yes, the same family that issued taxpayers’ money to victims of ‘Prince’ Andrew so that he doesn’t get arrested.

If white-collar crimes get treated so lightly, it’s hardly shocking that protesters get arrested routinely whereas the criminals they protest against receive police protection. In climate and antiwar activism this has become a universal truism. There’s this “tyranny of the white collar”, e.g. bailouts for abusive bankers (states habitually bail out the worst abusers instead of punishing them, encouraging further bad behaviour)

The perpetrators revel in this impunity while they buy and control the major media (to totally distort the narrative).

Remember that Sirius had many clients in the British government, so will cops lift the rock above this rattlesnake?

We still have a lot of material and ample evidence on this subject, but we shall continue another day in the future parts.

‘VE just taken a snapshot of the figures posted about an hour ago, showing that from 10059 deaths in week 17 of 2019 (before COVID-19 broke out) we rose to 12152, or an increase of 2093 deaths for the week. That’s an increase of 21%. Health emergency, right? Just don’t ask our government for comment… they’d rather not discuss this or investigate the cause/s.

Video download link | md5sum b43a8714d95a926e3a638b57659a2470
Quite Likely Last Year of Sirius
Creative Commons Attribution-No Derivative Works 4.0

Summary: The situation at Sirius ‘Open Source’ is getting grimmer by the day or by the week; there’s almost nobody left at the company and those who are still there look for a way out, an escape from the sinking ship

THE crimes of Sirius aside, as the police investigates these too slowly (as expected all along and right from the start), today we take a quick look at the company as seen from the eyes of Microsoft (LinkedIn). There seems to be almost nobody left there; from what we can gather, it’s a very contingency-based semi-operational mode, trying to retain what’s left of the contracts. A couple of months ago a reasonably new employee was given more authority, as others left the company, creating a highly critical skills vacuum.

Will the company reach its 25^th anniversary? That doesn’t seem so likely. For privacy reasons the video above does not show the screen and instead I’m reading or explaining what I am seeing before me (on a separate computer).