AWIO Action World International Organization FAKE Conference

Geisinger Medical Center is a real and well-regarded hospital/research center in northeastern Pennsylvania, USA.
Its CEO really is named Glenn Steele.
The remaining "information" in an invitation to an upcoming humanitarian "World Conference on Global Economy and Human Welfare" in January is evidently yet another version of previously-reported scams.

The story was published on Friday, November 27th, in the Press Enterprise newspaper of Bloomsburg, Pennsylvania, USA.

Scam uses Geisinger CEO

By JOHN-ERIK KOSLOSKY

Press Enterprise Writer

MAHONING TWP. –

Geisinger CEO Glenn Steele is among the experts scheduled to speak at the seventh annual "World Conference on Global Economy and Human Welfare" in January.

Problem is, there's no such conference.

And the promoter, "Action World International Organization," also apparently does not exist.

Steele's name was used in what looks to be a scam.
A writer from TheScientist.com said the supposed conference appears to be just a new kind of con to get potential attendees to give up their personal information, like credit card numbers.

It's kind of like that member of the Nigerian royal family who wanted to transfer money into your account a few years back, Bob Grant wrote in a piece posted on the magazine's Web site Tuesday.

Geisinger says it appears the people responsible for the invites simply lifted the speakers from the World Health Congress, a genuine event scheduled for April in Washington.
Steele is indeed scheduled to speak there.

Geisinger spokeswoman Patti Urosevich said the AWIO's conference is "fictitious."

The agenda for the conference posted on AWIO's Web site is rife with misspellings and bad grammar.
That includes the misspelling of Geisinger as "Gunslinger" Health System.
Several speakers are scheduled to give "speaches," and one is set to talk about the "edocution" of children.

Grant said he received an e-mail invitation to the event last week, and it prompted some skepticism.

"All I had to do was get in contact with the conference secretariat, one Grace Nathan, and I could be on my way to the meetings.
And – get this – I would even get my airfare and accommodation paid for!" Grant wrote.

Grant checked with the venue, AXA Equitable Auditorium in New York City.
An executive told him no such event has been booked for the location, he wrote.

"I can only assume that the scam involves getting hapless recipients to take the free airfare and accommodation bait, sending personal or financial information to the 'conference secretariat,'" Grant wrote.

Dubious details

The purported organization's Web site claims it "incubates global partnerships and increases youth participation in decision-making."

Its "mission," the site says, "is to contribute towards the efforts being made to improve the quality of life in communities."

It lists two issues on its home page: "Fighting Discrimination" and "Refugee Protection," along with brief paragraphs below, but does not mention how AWIO is involved in them.

The site includes links to two news stories, neither of which actually mention the organization.

The organization claims to be a non-profit registered in California. However, GuideStar, an organization that tracks non-profits, has no listing for the group.

AWIO lists offices in Manhattan and Washington, but the only telephone number on its Web site has a Long Island area code.

Calls to the number resulted in failed connections.

An e-mail to an address for the organization's secretary was not returned Wednesday.

John-Erik Koslosky reports for the Press Enterprise.
Got a news tip or story you think the community should know about? Call him at 387-1234, ext. 1306, or e-mail him at [email protected].

. . . and here is the original story as posted by Bob Grant on TheScientist.com website

News:
Another fake conference?
Posted by Bob Grant
[Entry posted at 24th November 2009 03:49 PM GMT]
View comments(19) | Comment on this news story

Are phony academic conferences the new Nigerian princes of the internet?

An email inviting recipients to a conference on human welfare and the global economy, said to be taking place in January and February of next year and featuring talks by some of the top scientists in the field, is making the rounds.

Last week, I received an email from someone going by the name of Alyssa Logan, who claimed to be "Youth Leader" at a group called the Action World International Organization (AWIO) and a member of the International Committee of the Red Cross. In the message, Logan invited me to the "Seventh Annual International Global combine Conference on Global Economy and Human Welfare" that AWIO was hosting. The conference would take place over the course of ten days at two separate sites, the first in New York City and the second in Dakar, Senegal in Africa.

All I had to do was get in contact with the conference secretariat, one Grace Nathan, and I could be on my way to the meetings. And -- get this -- I would even get my airfare and accommodation paid for!

There's only one problem. When I contacted the AXA Equitable Auditorium, the 400-seat venue where the New York City portion of the conference was to be held from January 25th to the 29th of next year, they had never heard of AWIO, or the conference they were supposedly planning. "No such event is scheduled for that location," said Chris Winans, senior vice president of external affairs for the AXA/Equitable Production Group.

Further confirmation that the conference was a sham came from the International Committee for the Red Cross, which told me that they had no record of an Alyssa Logan belonging to their organization.

An email to Nathan went unanswered, but when I replied directly to Logan at an "ireland.com" email address, she wrote back from a different email the next day. "Thanks, you mail was received and am happy for your acceptance to the invitation and also for your interest in today Economy," the email read. "I will be forwarding your mail to the conference secretariat in other for them to assist you with more information regarding registration purpose. You will receive a response from the organization secretary soon." Logan closed by writing "See you in December!"

December? I have yet to receive a response from the conference secretariat.

After some searching, I managed to find a website for AWIO, and discovered that they have posted an agenda for the meeting. Several prominent doctors and researchers who work in the public health field are listed as speakers on the agenda, so I decided to contact them and ask about their involvement in the conference.

"I've never heard from them," said Kevin Schulman, director of the Center for Clinical and Genetic Economics at Duke University, who was scheduled to give the opening speech on February 1 in Senegal. Schulman said that being listed as a speaker without his knowledge at a conference that isn't likely to even take place was a first for him. He also told The Scientist that the scammers had apparently done at least a little research in planning their ruse, because the list of speakers did represent key figures in the field. "If you had a health policy [meeting]," he said, "these are names that you would see."

Experts listed on the agenda included Robert Berenson, a physician who studies Medicare policy at the Washington, DC-based think tank the Urban Institute (the agenda misspells Berenson's surname "Branson"); and Glenn Steele, president of the Geisinger Health System, a physician-led healthcare provider based in Pennsylvania (the agenda comically misspells Geisinger as "Gunslinger").

The roll call of speakers seems to have been copied directly from the agenda of an actual meeting that occurred earlier this year. Schulman, Berenson, and Steele all spoke in February at the 2009 National Health Policy Conference (NHPC), hosted by health services research center Academy Health and held in Washington, DC. Many of the other NHPC participants are listed in the fraudulent agenda for the AWIO meeting. (Even Senator Ted Kennedy, who died in August, is listed as a speaker at the upcoming conference.)

I can only assume that the scam involves getting hapless recipients to take the free airfare and accommodation bait, sending personal or financial information to the "conference secretariat."

The fact that the perpetrators of this con took the time to at least partially familiarize themselves with big names in any particular field of research signals increasing sophistication among SPAMmers. This makes two seemingly phony conferences that The Scientist has uncovered this year. Beware the lure of expert-packed meetings in far-off places. If the deal sounds too good to be true, it probably is.


# Related stories:Conference kerfuffle hits scientists
[19th August 2009]

Thanks for posting that. You saved me the trouble.

A writer from TheScientist.com said the supposed conference appears to be just a new kind of con to get potential attendees to give up their personal information, like credit card numbers.

I'm not convinced about that though. More likely that fees will have to be paid via Western Union or Moneygram.
For visa, etc.