~ CyberCrime Crackdown ~

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Cybercrime Crackdown has nabbed 150

 

 

By Byron Acohido, USA TODAY

 

A summerlong crackdown on cybercrime has resulted in arrests or convictions of more than 150 individuals, Attorney General John Ashcroft announced Thursday.

As part of a 3-month-long collaborative probe, law enforcement officials across the nation have returned 117 criminal complaints stemming from an array of scams. The common thread: The crimes involved computers and the Internet. They bilked about 150,000 victims for losses topping $215 million.

 

"Operation Web Snare is the largest and most successful collaborative law-enforcement operation ever conducted to prosecute online fraud, stop identity theft and prevent other computer-related crimes," Ashcroft told reporters.

 

"We do not believe the Internet to be off base for law enforcement," he said. "We will be there with as much intensity and presence as we can muster."

 

Security experts praise the government's enforcement actions but note that cybercriminals remain in the driver's seat.

 

And, they say, contrary to initial media reports, regulators did not focus on slowing ordinary spam, most of which was made illegal by the Can-Spam Act, which took effect in January.

 

Spam continues to skyrocket. "As long as the government only goes after those who are committing especially aggravated criminal acts, that creates a sense of security for the run-of-the-mill spammer," says Pete Wellborn, an Atlanta lawyer who represents Internet service providers against spammers.

 

E-mail viruses spread by spam, network worms and contagions planted on popular Web pages continue to proliferate, driving up the number of personal computers infected with backdoor Trojans that turn control over to intruders. Hijacked PCs, called zombies, now number in the millions, widening the pool of machines crooks can use to carry out theft and extortion scams.

 

While praising the arrests, Alan Paller, research director at the SANS Institute, an Internet security think tank and training center, says it only scratches the surface. The government's crackdown "lacks any substantial effectiveness in stopping the larger security problems facing the average computer user," says Paller.

 

Those taken out of action include:

 

• A federal employee in Columbia, Mo., who stole an employee roster containing Social Security numbers for fellow workers. Accomplices then used the stolen data to apply for credit cards on the Internet.

 

• A Romanian who allegedly hacked into the online ordering system of a Santa Ana, Calif., equipment distributor to steal more than $10 million worth of computer hardware.

 

• A Ukrainian extradited from Cyprus to face a 40-count indictment for allegedly using Internet chat rooms to traffic stolen credit card numbers.

 

• A Pakistani who pleaded guilty to trying to extort $685,000 from apparel maker Eddie Bauer by threatening to post photos on the Web of the company using child labor.