Fraudsters registered a fake company at Mason Virnig's Beaverton home. Statewide complaints of the same scheme have nearly tripled since 2024.
A KGW investigation first reported that complaints of fraudulent address use filed with the Oregon Secretary of State rose from 29 in 2024 to 82 as of Sept. 21. Homeowners in Beaverton, Tigard, Portland and other Oregon cities have discovered companies they never started listed at their addresses in the state business registry.
Virnig told KGW he has received repeated mailings for a company called NEBULACAELUM INC, registered at his address without his knowledge. "It was not a company I started, and it was at my address. So I was worried," he said.
The scheme works because Oregon's business registration requires no government-issued identification. Anyone with $100 and a credit card can file. The Secretary of State's office acknowledged its systems cannot verify the accuracy of addresses in filings.
Oregon Secretary of State Tobias Read declined four interview requests from KGW over three weeks. Deputy chief of staff for communications Tess Seger said in a written statement that all filings are signed under penalty of perjury. When a complaint arises, the office attempts to contact the filer to obtain a correct address. If it cannot reach them, it withdraws the filing.
The process is complaint-driven.
Other states have moved faster. Minnesota enacted a law effective Jan. 1 allowing the state to undo fraudulent filings without a court order. Colorado officials can flag and remove batches of fraudulent filings without waiting for individual complaints. A September 2025 report by the National Association of Secretaries of State found that in most states, the filing office has little or no authority to reject a document or verify the information in it.
Residents who receive suspicious mail for an unknown company can contact the Secretary of State's Corporation Division at 503-986-2200 or file a complaint with the Oregon Department of Justice Consumer Hotline at 1-877-877-9392.
