Is Neo-Vo.com another scam?

In a previous complaint, someone said neo-vo.com is another scam launched by Tarun Trikha.

The website sells some jewelry and watches, but otherwise is devoid of info, other than something about residing in a building in Vancouver.

However, the "media" page contains some very bogus endorsements.

First picture is that of a stock photo of "generic happy aged man"

No idea who the 2nd picture is.

Third picture is that of Indra Nooyi, Indian-born CEO of PepsiCo.

The pattern suggests that whoever created this bogus testimonials page is Indian. Why else would they pick an Indian-born woman?

The address is also iffy.

"885 West Georgia Street 
Suite 1500, Box 1078 
Vancouver, BC, Canada V6C 3E8 "

Search of this address on Google shows at least two other companies at the same location. Indeed, Regus confirmed that it is a virtual office.

http://www.regus.com/locations/CA/Vancouver/VancouverHSBC.htm

Neo Vo, and NEO Survey are indeed linked to Goernani Goenawan, the "Vice President" of TVI Express. So she definitely has a hand in this scam.

Related articles

• Looks like TVI Express Scammer Gonarni Goenawan moved onto a new scam with same promises

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• Did Tarun Trikha launch more scams?

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Canadian Police RCMP believe fraud is same scale as illegal drugs

The RCMP believes fraud in Canada is approaching the size and scope of the drug trade.

Research shows that fraud is the crime that affects the most Canadians, said the head of the RCMP's major fraud unit.

RCMP Insp. Kerry Petryshyn said mass marketing fraud alone accounts for nearly $10 billion in fraud losses every year. 

"That's over a million victims," he said.

Total losses from the crime are actually $30 billion a year, police estimate.

"Which is pretty close to the drug industry here in Canada, however a lot more victims," he said.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/yourcommunity/2011/03/fraud-have-you-been-a-victim.html

Interesting: Solid Trust Pay is a Script-Kiddie Site? (UPDATED: not quite, no longer associated with TVI Express)

Image via WikipediaAccording to a post on Web of Trust (WOT), Solid Trust Pay, one of the processors used by TVI Express, is actually a packaged script offered by PlxWebDev / PayArk

I compared the "user agreement" and they are virtually identical. Here are the comparisons

From the "demo" site on plxwebdev

Buyer Beware - ePAY Online assumes absolutely no responsibility for any purchases made through the ePAY Online system. At any time you join any Income Opportunity or MLM program, or Matrix Website or purchase a product or service you are doing so at your own risk and that by signing up and joining ePAY Online you do hearby agree in FULL that you release ePAY Online and all its affiliates and officers, employees, members and owners from ANY loss you may incur either by using this service...

And from the SolidTrustPay.com website...

Buyer Beware - SolidTrust Pay assumes absolutely no responsibility for any purchases made or received through the system. At any time you join, or offer, any Income Opportunity or MLM program, or Matrix Website, purchase or offer a product or service, you are doing so at your own risk and that by signing up and joining you do hearby agree in FULL that you release SolidTrust Pay and all its affiliates and officers, employees, members and owners from ANY loss you may incur either by using this service ...

Even the misspelled "hearby" is there, still misspelled.  (It should be "hereby")

Conclusion: SolidTrust Pay is not any more trustworthy than your average PHP website. It has no reputation, nor even a real support team behind it. In fact, does it even have a banking license to hold people's money? Guess that's why STP is based in CANADA instead of the US. However, is that even legal? A "real" payment processor such as VersaPay is partnered with Chase Bank and is certified with Visa/Mastercard. STP displays Visa/Mastercard logo, but it's not linked, and apparently has no actual relationship with any real bank or VISA and Mastercard.

Before you ask, Yes, Paypal *does* have a Banking License in Europe, and is licensed for banking in 28 of the 50 states in the US, and the other states either don't need one or is satisfied with out-of-state banking license.

Even TVI Express' payment processor is shady...

UPDATE 15-JAN-2011 -- unconfirmed comment stated that "Solid Trust Pay" has disassociated with TVI Express since April 2009, and the script was indeed "founded" on plxWebDev scripts. You can see the actual comments below.

UPDATE 01-FEB-2011 -- authenticity of comment was confirmed by STP Support.  See 01-FEB-2011 blog entry.

More announcements from ex-TVI Patrick Dejour

Mr. Patrick Dejour, TVI Express North America, was remarkably honest about his own failure regarding TVI Express, and seems to be doing his best in spreading REAL information about TVI Express. Here's a very interesting announcement from his group:

September 12, 2010

After Full Investigative Research, the following can be Verified

  

After full investigative research, the following can be verified:

1) The Cease and Desist order in the state of Georgia is permanent

2) Several leaders have been identified in the state of Florida; state attorney has been contacted and a Cease and Desist order has been recommended

3) Investigative reporters propose to expose TVI Express as illegal in the state of Florida

4) Any leaders found promoting TVI Express will be subject to fines and prosecution in these states

5) RCMP in Canada have banned TVI Express

6) Tarun Trikha cannot get a Visa to enter the United States


It is estimated that TVI Express will be completely shut down within the next 60 days.

For further information:  info@tvinorthamerica.com  or call 206-350-9071

So Florida, possibly Hawaii, and Maryland may be acting upon TVI Express very soon. Remember, there is no confirmation for any of these news, as no source were cited except (1), which is supposedly witnessed by Mr. Dejour (he's the recipient).

Who's telling tall tales? Kapi and Jackson, who runs "increasemymonthlyincome", is claiming a CONVENTION in Florida in  January 2011.

Who's writing fiction, do you think? My bet is on Kaspi and Jackson, but you should decide for yourself. 

Anoop claims TVI Express member "scroller" is not fake, so what does he prove?

A member named "Anoop" claims that he also analyzed the scroller and claims it accesses live data. You can find his comments here:


The problem is, he claims he can see what data.php does, and it accesses live data. And that variable "c" proves it accesses "live data", according to Anoop.


Two problems with that assertion.

1) You can't see the source code of data.php, so unless he has direct access to the server, and can see the source code, you can't prove that it accesses real data. So what is he basing his claim on?

2) You can see the output, which is an XML file. But again, if it access some data and spits out an XML file, why would it need to access "gettimer", which essentially is a random number seed?

When I asked Anoop to answer these questions, he instead points back at the data, and claims that the data *does* change, without providing any proof. Clearly, he wants me to do all the work. Which echoes the answer "Vanessa" gave a few months back: "I say it does change".

So to give Anoop benefit of a doubt, I did the test AGAIN...

I used one browser, and one access method, to pull down content of data.php. It came out to be 25KB of data. I had to transform the data a little bit to import it into OpenOffice Calc, but it came out to be... EXACTLY 500 entries.

I used a different browser, and a different access method (to ensure I got a different IP address), 20 minutes later, and pulled the content of data.php AGAIN. Imported that into a separate sheet of OpenOffice Calc. The file is also about 25KB... and I got exactly 500 lines as well after import.

Isn't that interesting... 

So I looked at the files directly... the beginning is the different, and ending is different. So maybe it's only tracking 500 members? That is possible, even though the site usually claims to have over 1000 people online at a time.

Then an idea hit me... I should SORT the data, by the first and second fields (look like member name and country). So I sorted both sheets by those fields.

I ended up with exactly the same data... in both sheets.

I was so surprised, I thought I must have messed up. I hit undo on both sheets, and compared to original XML import. There was no mistake. After I sort both, I end up with same file.

I repeated the import process, making sure I did not mess with the data. I also took random spot checks, a dozen names randomly from the first file. They are indeed all in the second file, just in a different location.

This CONCLUSIVELY PROVES that the data is fake. They just threw the same 500 names through a shuffler and spits out the same file in a different order each time it's pulled.

Go ahead, try it yourself. Pull one copy of http://www.tviexpress.com/data.php  at one time, then wait X minutes or hours and pull a second copy. Import, sort, and compare. I'll bet you will end up with the same 500 entries.  It begins with "17picorp2010" from Canada, and ends with "ziphog12mc" from South Africa.
TVI Express: replacing one fake with another.

P.S. Anoop now insist he checked membership list against "lost password" list and they "seem to match". Since when does TVI Express make their "lost password" list public? Why would such a list be public any way? Is Anoop a TVI Express employee?

P.P.S. Furthermore, the whole idea that a Flash object needs to access an XML file, generated through PHP, which gets the data from unknown source is ludicrous. The "currently logged in members list" should be a table on the server, and the Flash object should be able to access the table DIRECTLY without any intermediary such as data.php or XML file.

Thus, the fact that Flash Object have to access an XML file generated through PHP indicates that
a) the file was a fake all along, there was no database; or
b) the programmers for TVI Express were incompetent; or
c) TVI Express got cheated as someone basically did something with 4x the effort needed.

None of which is good for TVI Express, because a) says TVI Express is a fake (and judged by all the other fakery it had engaged in, there really is no surprise, b) says TVI Express employs idiots to do its work, and c) says TVI Express employs idiot managers to supervise work needed.  Maybe b) and c) are why the "booking portal" took almost a year to complete?

P.P.P.S. And Anoop, thanks for reminding me to check the data again, and put ANOTHER nail in TVI Express's coffin.

Classic TVI Express Member Lies

Today, we present another set of classic TVI Express lies. Previously, we found a letter from Mr. Goyal, that claims TVI Express was related to a glass factory in Italy, and a casino/resort in England. What sort of lies will we find this time?  The original in Chinese, dated May 23 2009, is at http://xiecheng51.spaces.live.com/blog/cns!FB3360FAB196CDAE!146.entry but I'll just translate it for you...

TVI快车--其合法性

TVI Express and its legitimacy

公司合法，手续齐全，因为涉及出国不归等政治因素，旅游公司的设立必须符合国际惯例，其上千万的注册资金需求以及数百万质量保证金要求就让很多人望而却步，而且成立旅游公司不是任何人都可以为之！

Company is legal, and all necessary steps are complete. Due to involvement in travel and other political factors, establishing a travel company must conform to international common practices, and tens of thousands must be invested for registration, and millions must be put up in performance bonds, which will discourage most people. Establishing a travel company is not something that can be done by anybody!

MLM Attorney explains what is a legal MLM; TVI Express is not

EmJay07, who has a blog of his own that criticizes my blogs (usually without basis, but that would be an opinion), cited. A Mr. Nehra, one of the few attorneys what specialized in MLM, for some reference to something about pay commission in certain cases are legal, and claim that somehow proves he knows MLM law.

What he did not realize is Mr. Nehra actually published an article on what constitutes a legal MLM (at least in the US of A and Canada), which I will quote below. And TVI Express does NOT fit the criteria listed. Therefore, TVI Express cannot be legal in the US of A or Canada, and very likely, in my opinion, not legal in the rest of the world.

Another marketing coach calls TVI Express a scam

You can read his article here:  http://www.articlesphere.com/Article/Expert-TVI-Express-Scam-Analysis/214286 and it comes with a warning:

For those of you residing in the United States and/or Canada, and possibly other countries but I only speak on what I'm certain of, there is a well documented history of distributors getting held lawfully responsible for involvement in an illegal pyramid. Even if you had the best of intentions, realize that TVI Express resides in the UK so if the powers that be are going to go after anybody, it will be the top earnings earners here locally.

In other words, you can be held LIABLE under LOCAL laws for running a pyramid scheme, esp. those of you who got the "big payout"! 

TVI Express: 7 questions you should ask before joining

NOTE: This is a companion article to "TVI Express: 8 verified facts you need to know before joining"

TVI Express claims to be a "multinational conglomerate headquartered in London, UK", and lets you make $10000+ in weeks. If it sounds too good to be true... well, it probably is. At the minimum, read the 8 facts above (and click on the links I provided so you can see for yourself), then ask yourself these questions I pose:

1. Just where exactly is TVI Express located?

If you said, London, you'd be wrong. TVI Express is no longer a London Company. They now list a Cyprus address (just go to their website, says so right at the bottom), even though they use a London phone number, and claims to be a London company. So why aren't they listed as a UK company (search in UKData.com)? Any if they are a London UK company, why do they claim that they are only subject to Cyprus and India laws? (See their Terms of Service at the bottom)

Why is this relevant? Simple: if you ever have problems, who do you call, or even arrange a face-to-face meeting? Or legally speaking, whose law is applicable? Can you afford to hire a lawyer in that area in case you have a legal dispute? To which government do you report the problem to? And why would you hand over money to a company if you don't even know where it is located?

TVI Express: even their "matrix" is recycled scam

Those who are in Australia may have heard of GoldenGalaxy, and those in Canada may have heard of CashClub. Both operated something very similar to a matrix, which is just a fancy name for a pyramid. And both were subsequently convicted of being an 8-ball scam, which is just a variation of the pyramid.



(see http://www.fraudsandscams.com/examples.htm and search for Cash Club and Golden Galaxy)

Need a reminder on what an 8-ball scam looks like? Here's the Wikipedia entry:

As I've shown before, the TVI Express traveller's board and express board, or matrix, or whatever they want to call them, is an 8-ball scam. This is from a TVI member's website, tviexpresstravel.info :



So either the TVI Express member is lying and posted a fake picture to illustrate TVI Express, or he had just proven that TVI Express's matrix, both of them, are 8-ball scams.

And yet you still find TVI Express boosters such as Lynette, who keep posting personal attacks, yet failed to explain any of these "striking similarities", to put it kindly. (I personally would call them "smoking guns".)

When one speaks bullshit for too long, one starts to believe in one's own bullshit. This is especially true if one needs to believe in one's bullshit in order to sell it to other people.

TVI Express: recycled Fortuna Alliance pyramid scam

Image via Wikipedia

In the 1990's, when Internet is still young, the FTC busted a pyramid scammer called "Fortuna Alliance", that promised the same things that TVI Express is promising today. Want to see how much of a copycat TVI Express is when compared to a PROVEN scammer, the Fortuna Alliance? You won't like what you see, esp. if you are a member of TVI Express.

"In the complaint detailing the charges, the FTC charged that Fortuna Alliance, L.L.C., and four officers, marketed the pyramid scheme through a home page on the World Wide Web and with printed promotional materials. Using fabulous earnings claims, they induced tens of thousands of consumers in over 60 countries around the world to pay between $250 and $1750 to join their pyramid scheme, claiming that members would receive over $5,000 per month in 'profits' as others were induced to 'enroll.' In addition, Fortuna and its officers provided advice and promotional materials for members to recruit others to join the pyramid, both through direct contact and by setting up their own web sites. The FTC's complaint asked the court to order a permanent halt to the alleged deceptive practices and to order redress for the people Fortuna signed up to the scheme."

Cited from http://www.mlmlegal.com/fortunaftc.html

TVI Express: the final verdict

This will really be the final word on TVI Express I will write. It will be a summary of all the previous entries. However, I will also post a translation of the Chinese article, as the Google Translation isn't that good. Any way, here goes...

TVI Express: The Final Verdict

Tens of Thousands of people have been lured by the promise of quick profits, i.e. "earn up to $15000 in a week" to join "TVI Express" all around the world. India, China, and now the US. This supposedly London-based company claims to sell discounted travel vouchers. However, TVI Express is a Ponzi scam, plain and simple. They may have hidden their deeds pretty well, but there are enough clues out there for everybody to find. But will you see it, or stay in self-denial?

The problems of TVI Express are plenty. For organization, I've divided it up into three categories: company background suspicions, company practice suspicions, and finally, faulty retorts.

Oh, and who 'certified' TVI Express?

Image by Larry and Laura via Flickr

Some people are claiming that TVI Express has been "approved" by various consumer websites. Let's see what's at the bottoom of TVI Express website...

Thawte -- legitimate site, but all it certifies is that TVI Express uses valid SSL encryption. You can buy that for a website for $250. That doesn't say anything about the legitimacy of the business. Usefulness: D

Better Internet Bureau -- while it sounds impressive, BIB is a private company out of CANADA, and NOT affiliated in any way with Better Business Bureau. They claim to "approve" websites for inclusion, but there's a fee: $45. And there's no way to "validate" the display of this seal. There is no list at BIB's website to look up if the company is REALLY allowed to display the BIB seal. Usefulness: D

TVI Express: completely illegitimate scam

Image via Wikipedia

Let's do an informal test... Let us use Google as a research tool on what people think about TVI Express.

If you do this search:

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&client=firefox-a&rls=org.mozilla%3Aen-US%3Aofficial&hs=CZD&q=tvi+express+news&aq=f&oq=&aqi=


You get "about 86200 results.

However, if you do a filter of all that to "news only" (click on "show options", then click on news on the left), you get ZERO results. In other words, NONE of these 86200 results came from what Google considers to be a "legitimate news source".