Scam

US Convicts Nigerian 419 Email Scammer (TechDirt, 22 April 2010) - speaks for itself.

Fraud, spam and co

An old article I retrieved today from my pile. The author, Charles Arthur, wonder whether convicting spammers in the US will put an end to spam. A rather pessimist response, understandably. What interested me was the fact that spam can be linked to fraud and criminal organisations with data collected beeing sold back or with botnet spamming created and then offered to eastern European criminal gangs.
So as usual, if people were not so gullable, there will be a bit less fraud and spam.

"Will convicting five major spammers put an end to spam?" The Guardian, 24 June 2010


For other articles on sale of private data and fraud,
"Welcome to DarkMarket – global one-stop shop for cybercrime and banking fraud", The Guardian, 15 January 2010, page 3

"T-Mobile staff sold customers' details to rivals", The independent, 18 November 2009

Further fraud this time with carbon trading, "Fraud Besets E.U. Carbon Trade System", The NY Times, 8 February 2010

and issues of security for smartphones: "Mobile security: Hackers kept at bay by lack of a standard platform" Financial TImes 15 February 2010

The end of the road...

"'Godfather of Spam' sentenced to four years" (ZDnet.co.uk, 25 November 2009) and £ 150,000 to forfeit, if Alan Ralsky has them....

Virtual worlds and money makers

well, anybody ready this blog would have guessed that the title of the post attracted me. It's about scams in virtual worlds to get people to sign/buy things they don't really need. It's a technique which builds up on what virtual worlds are made for, earning money, although the technique is in itself quite inadmissible and should be distinguished to the features offered to participants such as additional memberships etc...
But what really is interesting are the comments made after that post. I particularly liked one made by JGM on NOvember 9th, who explained, if I understood him/her well, that virtual goods are a valid business model because it is programmers selling the fruit of their labor in a very competitive market. As such, the sale of virtual goods was completely different from scam/spams which rely on illegal actions to force somebody into spending money (=fraud).

Virtual Goods, Scams, Investigative Reporting And The Media (TechDirt, 9 November 2009)

Twitter issues

A judge banned the use of Twitter in the courtroom; it is a form of broadcast in the sense that put all together the threads form a good picture of what happened; on the other hand, one does not need to be journalist to tweet.
Judge Says No Twittering From The Courtroom (TechDirt, 10 November 2009)


THis is rather silly and a complete misunderstanding of what Twitter as a company does. Levi Johnston's Lawyers Threaten Twitter, Despite No Legal Basis (TechDirt, 9 November 2009)

And the issue of spam also seems a bit hyped up. It Doesn't Matter How Many Twitter URLs Are Malware... Only If People Are Clicking (TechDirt, 30 October 2009)

Funny side of sentencing

I found it really funny: a spammer realising that the fine cannot be paid by his insurance!
Spammer Discovers His Insurance Policy Doesn't Cover $6 Million Spam Fines (TechDirt, 3 August 2009)

Diversity of access to computers/information

URL website based to distribute malware:
Trojan swipes money from your banking site (ZDNet.co.uk, 30 september 2009)

with a similar method:
Facebook closes fake profiles spreading malware (ZDnet.co.uk, 2 oct 2009)
Fake Outlook Web Access update sets malware trap (ZDnet.co.uk, 16 October 2009)

Un botnet s'attaque aux résultats de recherche des moteurs (JDN, 05 October 2009) with a botnet allowing fraud/spread of malware resulting from clicks on results from search engines, the click redirecting towards a website. See its English version, Botnet click fraud hits a high (ZDnet.co.uk, 23 October 2009)

Access/use of webmail accounts
Phishing attack hits thousands of Hotmail accounts (ZDnet.co.uk, 06 october 2009)
and a resurgence of the 419 scams! Washington Post Says Economy Is Bad... No, Good... No, Bad For Nigerian 419 Scammers (TechDirt, 10 August 2009)

Hacked web mail accounts used to send spam (ZDnet.co.uk, 09 October 2009)

Spam and scam: trends confirmed

why spam continues to fill up our boxes? because some of us continue to fall for it, enough obviously to make spam a viable option.
12% of Americans do open spam messages and fall in the trap according to the Messaging Anti-Abuse Working Group (MAAWG)

Le spam séduit 12% des internautes nord-américains (JDN, 16 July 2009)

which seems in line with the following story: that the social networking firm Tagged.com spammed in order to get people to subscribe to its services. Le 3ème résau social US accusé de spammer l'Internet mondial (JDN, 10 July 2009). Obviously in breach of CAN-Spam Act and fined by the Federal Trade COmmission

DDOS practice by security firms

In order to shut down those sending spam and scams (particularly phishing), security firms can identify the original server and then send e-mails to shut down the site

Sébastien Darnault (MarkMonitor)"Nous bombardons les serveurs de mails frauduleux jusqu'à les faire tomber" (JDN 2 June 2009)

Damages by spamming

Harm is a key concept, although elusive concept, to justify crimininalisation of behaviours. Here the case seems to justify the policy to criminalise spamming "Spammers Ordered To Pay $236 Million" (8 October 2008)

Fraud and spamming: the US

I have not looked at it in details, but spamming in the US is tacled through fraud. Would the new offence in the UK cover the same ground? Suggestions welcome... "Top Spammer Pleads Guilty, But Spam Still Going Strong" (17 March 2008) http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20080316/212058558.shtml

Spamming: money, money, money..

Like hacking and the like, spamming is very profitable an activity, especially when linked with stock trading. According to this article, £1.5m in one summer, more than the salary in one's life time for most of us; and guess where they are coming from, sadly? Russia, HK and Canada, highlighting a constant feature of cybercrime, i.e. it is global crime.
The article does not hint on how the investigation has been done, but i'll be curious to know if the stock exchanges internal police were involved...

"US indicts pump-and-dump 'spam king' " (4 January 2008)
http://news.zdnet.co.uk/security/0,1000000189,39291884,00.htm

Why spam is a crime or should be one...

Spam is a regular occurence on IT newspapers or columns. But this case illustrates particularly well why spam should be a crime, independently of its outcome (whether it incites to defraud others)...

http://news.zdnet.co.uk/security/0,1000000189,39290558,00.htm

Spam, waste of money or money maker?

Regular posting about spam fill my mail box, always to complain about the waste of time and money it creates. But nobody complains about the junk mail they receive in their postal mailbox, although sometimes it amounts to the only mail received in a week. Why then electronic junk mail like spam gets the headline cover so often? The article is just starting to give an answer...
http://news.zdnet.co.uk/security/0,1000000189,39290391,00.htm