Alleged California mailbox “fraud factory” hiding in plain sight on busy street, expert says

By Kristine Lazar

A storefront on Burbank Boulevard that once held roughly 100 P.O. boxes may be linked to a wave of suspected identity theft and fraud. A CBS California Investigates report examined how criminals can use these kinds of mailboxes to intercept stolen and fabricated identities.

Visitors to the location could see dozens of P.O. boxes on the wall earlier this year, but recently, the space was found to be cleared out, with the front door left unlocked, and the business still advertised on the front window.

The business operated under the name “Mailbox LA” and displayed signage for Anytime Mailbox — an international mail-center chain. Anytime Mailbox told CBS California Investigates that the Burbank location was not affiliated with its company, and the U.S. Postal Inspector confirmed the site was never registered with the USPS, a federal requirement for commercial mail facilities.

“What we’re looking at when we talk about this business is a fraud factory,” said CBS LA Fraud Expert David Maimon, who works with banks to identify fraudulent activity as Head of Fraud Insights at SentiLink. “A fraud factory that people are walking past, running past, driving past every day and [they’re] none the wiser.”

Maimon said one of his banking clients flagged the Burbank address after spotting suspicious activity tied to it.

“It essentially means a lot of identities we’re able to pin to this specific address, which, according to our investigations, are either synthetic or stolen identities,” Maimon said.

Maimon said the evidence suggests the thieves are using those identities to open bank accounts and take out loans without the victims’ knowledge.

His research found that about 80% of the about 200 identities connected to the address were used to open new bank accounts, and roughly 10% were used to attempt to secure new loans, he said. Mail linked to the location included statements and cards from major issuers such as American Express and Capital One.

Maimon said opening a fraudulent mailbox business reflects a broader pattern of fraud operations relocating to avoid detection.

“The fraud infrastructure keeps moving around, and this is a great example of how the infrastructure simply relocated from one place to another,” he said, adding that the mobility makes such operations “harder to find” and easier to run “under the radar.”

CBS California Investigates is unaware of who moved the mailboxes or where they were moved to. 

Mailbox fraud also targets residential neighborhoods

Rita, a San Fernando Valley landlord who asked that her last name not be shared for privacy reasons, said her rental property has received dozens of pieces of mail — including debit cards and checking account materials — addressed to two people she said never lived there.

“At first, actually, I thought it was a mistake,” Rita said. “But then I started to get all this mail, and more mail, banking mail, and debit cards and checking.”

Using a forensic tool called “Intercept,” which uses machine learning data analytics to detect fraud, Maimon determined that the names on the mail sent to Rita’s address were linked to fraudulent bank accounts.

“[I’m] really just shocked to see it, because I never thought it’d happen to me,” Rita said.

She said the incident has made her more attentive to her mail and believes similar fraud may be going undetected elsewhere. “I suspect there’s a lot more fraud, and it just — nobody’s paying attention,” she said.

Investigators call the Burbank scheme unusually brazen

Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Detective Sgt. Pete Hish, of the department’s Fraud and Cyber Crime Unit, said mail thieves typically target unoccupied homes and unsecured or poorly secured mailboxes in residential neighborhoods.

“They scout out the neighborhoods. They know what houses are unoccupied that can receive mail,” Hish said. “They know which mailboxes in those neighborhoods are open — not locked. Or even if they’re locked, they’ll break them open and take the mail anyways.”

But he said the Burbank storefront represented an escalation in tactics.

“It’s even more bold to open up an actual place where it appears that their only purpose is to receive stolen identity mail,” Hish said.

The person listed in public records as the building’s owner did not respond to phone calls or emails from CBS California Investigates.

Burbank business remains licensed despite findings

CBS California Investigates found the mailbox business listed as “active and in good standing” on the California Secretary of State’s website, which handles business licensing.

A spokesperson for the Secretary of State’s office said the agency does not have authority to regulate the activities of the businesses it licenses, and that oversight falls to law enforcement, other state or local agencies, or private civil lawsuits.

CBS California Investigates attempted to contact every identity associated with the Burbank address and heard back from three people, all of whom live overseas and said they had no connection to the location. They all believe their identities have been stolen.

What can consumers do?

Maimon and Hish urge consumers to take several precautions:

• Freeze credit reports with major credit bureaus to prevent new accounts or loans from being opened fraudulently.
• Sign up for identity theft protection services that send alerts when someone applies for credit or a loan under their name.
• Check credit reports regularly for unfamiliar accounts or inquiries.
• Monitor mailboxes closely and report unfamiliar mail addressed to other names at your address.