A large Google AdSense publisher said his AdSense account was hacked into a month or so ago. A guy went in, changed his payee information to an address in India and he didn't notice until the payment was sent already. The publisher emailed Google about four weeks ago and has yet to receive a response from Google. So he posted a thread at WebmasterWorld to complain and get some advice.
It appears from this publisher's posts in the forum that he makes between $20,000 and $30,000 per month with Google AdSense. If that is the case, you have to imagine the check that went to this Indian address was about that amount.
The five-year old WebmasterWorld member said:
Someone hacked my Adsense account.The payment has been re-routed to a person in India.
I found Google Adsense's support email and sent them an email with all the details. That was four weeks ago.
Zero response. Google can't figure out how this was done or how to stop it.
If you're using Adsense, you must watch it closely. It's hackable. And Google can't stop it.
So far, Google has not yet responded, but honestly, I am not sure what Google can do at this point.
Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld.