Quatloos.com is an anti-fraud website maintained by a non-profit corporation, Financial and Tax Fraud Education Associates, Inc.[1] It evolved out of a basic educational website on the topic created in 1997 by Jay Adkisson,[2] an attorney and stockbroker,[1] who has testified as an expert witness before the US Senate Finance Committee.[3][4]

Quatloos!
Tony-the-Wonder-Llama and a pirate flag bracket the site name
Cyber Museum of Scams & Frauds
Type of site
Finance
Available inEnglish
Founded1997
Founder(s)Jay Adkisson
URLhttp://quatloosia.blogspot.com/

Forbes selected it as one of its "Best of The Web" sites in 2000.[2] In 2003, it was featured in PC Magazine's "Site of the Week" series,[5] and was included in their 2004 feature on the top 100 undiscovered web sites, where it was recommended as a good place to learn about scams and fraud.[6] In the 2000s it was cited as an authoritative source for scams in the financial media,[7][8] and by government organizations,[9][10] and had reportedly been frequented by employees of the US Justice and Treasury departments, as well as those of the US federal courts.[11]

In 2010, the blog was moved from its original domain at Quatloos.com to a blogspot page.[12] The updates and activity on the site lessened over the next decade, with its final post in December 2022.[13]

Etymology

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The term quatloos appears in an episode of Star Trek, although it may have been in use prior to this; it was the name of a currency used for betting in the episode "The Gamesters of Triskelion." It was chosen for the site as it has come to mean a "fictional currency," appropriate for a site that fights fraudulent money scams.[1]

References

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  1. ^ a b c "About Quatloos.com". Quatloos!.
  2. ^ a b "Build Your Own Soapbox". Forbes. 11 September 2000.
  3. ^ "Contributor Jay Adkisson Full Bio". Forbes.
  4. ^ "Taxpayer Beware: Schemes, Scams, and Cons" (PDF). Committee On Finance United States Senate. 5 April 2001. p. 3.
  5. ^ "Site of the Week: Quatloos". PC Magazine. 13 June 2003.
  6. ^ "Quatloos!". PC Magazine. 20 April 2004. p. 90.
  7. ^ "Tax Scams". The Motley Fool. 3 January 2003.
  8. ^ "Let's get serious". MarketWatch. 17 January 2008.
  9. ^ "Consumer Alert: Stranger-Originated Life Insurance (STOLI)". Ohio Department of Insurance.
  10. ^ "Financial Planning or Fleecing of Seniors?". California State Senate Insurance Committee]]. 27 February 2003. Archived from the original on 31 January 2017.
  11. ^ "White Hats Take to the Web to Dispel Anti-Tax Schemes". New York Times. 25 March 2004.
  12. ^ "Quatloos!". quatloosia.blogspot.com. Retrieved 2023-02-24.
  13. ^ "Quatloos!". quatloosia.blogspot.com. Retrieved 2023-02-24.