Online Vigilantes Still Scamming The Scammers

Grok Headline matches for Online Vigilantes Still Scamming The Scammers

What Do You Think of Online Vigilantes?

What Do You Think of Online Vigilantes? 07/24/2004 01:14 PM

Ireland Cracks Down on Online Scammers

Ireland Cracks Down on Online Scammers 09/23/2004 05:20 AM

Online Merchants Beat Back Scammers

Online Merchants Beat Back Scammers 09/22/2004 12:08 PM

Scamming the Scammer

Scamming the Scammer 05/15/2004 02:52 AM
P-P-P-Powerbook: Scamming the Scammer .. The ultimate ebay insult II

p-p-p-powerbook.com
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Is the Video Professor scamming people?

Is the Video Professor scamming people? 04/15/2004 02:28 AM
I'll let you all be the judge but their is no way I would allow my mom to order one...

Scamming Software Company Scams Again

Scamming Software Company Scams Again 09/03/2004 06:19 PM
You may recall Bonzi software as the company that used to run pop-up ads trying to trick you into thinking there was something wrong with your computer. They eventually settled a lawsuit about those ads, but were dinged again earlier year for knowingly collecting data from children under 13 via their BonziBuddy product (as the article notes, the data they collected included the birthdate of the children making the "knowingly part a slam dunk"). It appears that neither previous case is going to keep Bonzi from staying on the legal side of their advertising practices, as they've now settled yet another case brought by the FTC for false advertising about their "anti-phishing, anti-virus" product that, in truth, does very little. However, that doesn't stop their advertisements from first telling you that all of your personal information can be taken by thieves, and that their software will protect you completely from the threat. Isn't there some sort of three strikes law for scamming companies?

U.S. Says It Got Afghan From Vigilantes
(AP)

U.S. Says It Got Afghan From Vigilantes
(AP) 07/22/2004 04:45 AM
AP - The U.S. military acknowledged Thursday it held an Afghan man for a month after taking custody of him from a trio of American counterterror vigilantes who have since been arrested on charges of torturing prisoners at a private jail they ran in the Afghan capital.

Do We Need Security Vigilantes?

Do We Need Security Vigilantes? 05/18/2004 11:52 AM
As governments get concerned about how to fight off online crime, a new study has come out saying that law enforcement needs better skills at fighting online crime, and not more money. Of course, the immediate response to that is exactly how are they supposed to get these skills without more money? Since everyone likes to compare the internet to the "wild west," it certainly sounds like a situation where there are very few law enforcement officials out here in the "wild west of the internet" and one of the biggest things that could be done to help stop online crime is to get a few more out here. With that in mind, I guess it's no surprise that we already see amateur sleuths banding together for vigilant e justice online. And, of course, the latest such vigilante action that's quickly making its way to internet legend status is the story of the p-p-p-powerbook.

Scamming Spammer Hooks the Wrong Person

Scamming Spammer Hooks the Wrong Person 11/01/2003 06:29 PM
CrypticSpawn writes "Read on SecurityFocus, a 55 year old woman spammed an FBI computer crime agent. She got caught mailing off a credit card scam to AOL ...

Net vigilantes target 419 sites

Net vigilantes target 419 sites 08/02/2004 06:42 AM
The Register Aug 2 2004 10:52AM GMT

Trial of Accused U.S. Vigilantes Resumes
(AP)

Trial of Accused U.S. Vigilantes Resumes
(AP) 08/23/2004 04:39 AM
AP - The trial of three American vigilantes accused of torturing a dozen Afghan prisoners during a freelance hunt for terrorists entered its final stage Monday, with the judge saying a verdict was likely soon.

t r u t h o u t - William Rivers Pitt |
Scamming the Media, Parlock Style

t r u t h o u t - William Rivers Pitt |
Scamming the Media, Parlock Style 09/19/2004 06:00 PM
this article on the subject .. More on Phil Parlock .. William Rivers Pitt .. Phil

truthout.org/docs_04/091804X.shtml
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"Child vigilantes apprehend pervy freak"

"Child vigilantes apprehend pervy freak" 05/26/2004 07:51 PM

Leaders chat, border vigilantes mobilize

Leaders chat, border vigilantes mobilize 03/23/2005 08:12 PM
As Bush meets with Vicente Fox and Paul Martin, is the illegal-immigration issue about to boil over?

Microsoft goes after Scammers

Microsoft goes after Scammers 04/03/2005 03:56 PM
About Apr 3 2005 7:45PM GMT

16 scammers fined £1.3m

16 scammers fined £1.3m 04/01/2005 11:17 AM
Premium rate watchdog acts

New IE bug may be scammers best friend

New IE bug may be scammers best friend 12/10/2003 01:13 AM
ZDNet Australia Dec 10 2003 0:24AM ET

HotJobs For Scammers!

HotJobs For Scammers! 05/17/2004 04:36 AM
We first posted about scammers (often those same Eastern European organized crime groups who are having so much fun with spam and phishing operations) using job boards like Monster and HotJobs to recruit suckers to launder money for them a year ago. Now, however, the NY Times has picked up on the story and it looks like (as these things are known to do) the scam has changed a bit. Last year, the scammers would hire unsuspecting rubes to ship packages to Eastern Europe. They would claim to be a shipping company that was hiring people in the US in their spare time to pass on the packages. Lots of people fell for it. The latest trick, though, is for the scammers to claim to be software companies in Eastern Europe looking to accept payments from US customers - and thus, in need of someone in the US to handle their "payment processing." They post these ads on the job boards and when people answer them, they're expected to receive payments into their personal PayPal account and then send the money to Eastern Europe. Of course, what happens is that PayPal/eBay eventually notices an awful lot of money going into this account and is alerted that it's from stolen credit cards. The sucker who's been passing on the money is told they need to pay it back to PayPal while the folks in Eastern Europe invest in more ads on these job boards. The article mostly focuses on the fact that those tricked are angry at the job websites for not protecting them against such frauds. Some are worried that these types of frauds may end up damaging the reputations of the job sites. While that is a risk, I still can't believe anyone would ever agree to process payments into their personal account and send it on to Eastern Europe without suspecting something was not right.

Scammers Going To Jail

Scammers Going To Jail 05/18/2004 11:52 AM
It looks like some internet scammers are finally getting some serious jailtime. A man who was caught running a phishing scam has just been sentenced to 46 months in prison. Meanwhile, the guy who conned lots of Wall Street insiders out of half a million dollars by telling them he was sellin g pre-IPO shares in Google has entered a guilty plea in the case, and now faces 51 to 63 months in jail. I have no problem putting such obvious scammers in jail for breaking the law. I do wonder, however, if the punishment really fits the crime.

Text scammers fined £450,000

Text scammers fined £450,000 05/24/2004 10:32 AM
'Justice has been done' says UK e-minister

Microsoft Sues 117 Scammers

Microsoft Sues 117 Scammers 04/02/2005 08:31 PM
CIO Today Apr 3 2005 12:49AM GMT

Nigeria Arrests 419 Scammers

Nigeria Arrests 419 Scammers 07/06/2004 01:42 PM

Nigeria arrests 500 suspected email scammers: Nigeria finally took some action on 419 scammers. I hereby retract this post.

Nigeria's agency against economic and financial crime said Monday that it had detained more than 500 suspects and seized property worth more than $US500 million from suspected fraudsters.

[...] The EFCC had demonstrated its resolve and commitment by arresting many previously "untouchable 419 kingpins", said Ribadu, a former senior police intelligence officer.

Although the identities of those in EFCC custody are not formally revealed, observers noted that they included legislators, lawyers, politicians, bankers and public functionaries.

A couple points to note here. First, look at the type of people arrested: lawyers, legislators (!), politicians, etc. Nice. Second, they seized $500 million? 419 scamming was evidently going well for these folks.

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BT cuts off dialler scammers

BT cuts off dialler scammers 06/30/2004 11:09 AM
Pull the plug first, ask questions later...

Scammers use Gmail invit

Scammers use Gmail invit 09/15/2004 02:59 PM
Techzonez Sep 15 2004 6:44PM GMT

Baiting 419 Scammers For Sport

Baiting 419 Scammers For Sport 11/17/2003 04:17 AM
There have been an increasing number of "filler" stories from reporters who need something to write about and notice a 419 scam email in their inbox and decide to write the scammer back. Either these reporters don't realize that this article has been written 100 times before, or they just don't care. However, a group of other folks have decided that instead of using the experience to write up an article, they're going to do their best to publicly humiliate 419 scammers. It's turned into something of a sport for many - who create elaborate personas and stories in order to scam the 419ers themselves. Of course, they're trying to trick them out of their dignity, rather than their money.

Nigerian Scammers get Busted

Nigerian Scammers get Busted 07/01/2004 01:58 AM
According to ABC News, the old Nigerian money scam is alive and well. Even with a major raid by the Nigerian government, there are still Nigerian “Kingpins that remain untouchable. The best defense against this sort of scam is in my opinion, a combination of common sense and education on the subject.

Artists Against 419 Takes On Scammers

Artists Against 419 Takes On Scammers 05/02/2004 07:46 PM

More on Scammers Abusing TTY Services

More on Scammers Abusing TTY Services 04/15/2004 01:00 PM

Spammers, Miscreants, Scammers, Etc

Spammers, Miscreants, Scammers, Etc 12/30/2003 01:23 AM
How on earth are we supposed to be able to believe anything we see on the internet, including message coming from our ISP’s, Friends, FAMILY ? Scammers, and Spammers have take over nearly every type of communication we have, including...

Watch out, there be scammers about,
warns watchdog

Watch out, there be scammers about,
warns watchdog 03/23/2005 12:46 PM
If it's too good to be true...

419 scammers start working the phones

419 scammers start working the phones 01/26/2004 08:32 AM
Hello, I'm the Son of the Late Head of State

Software To Catch Nigerian 419 Scammers

Software To Catch Nigerian 419 Scammers 06/07/2004 01:56 PM
If you've ever received an email from Nigeria asking for a small sum of money in order to get millions, you know what the 419 scam is. (Or you're still waiting for a lot of money that hasn't quite shown up yet.) The '419' comes from the Nigerian criminal code section against fraud, and to prevent the scams, Nigeria is looking into using software to help track down the scammers by scanning emails for keywords. This brings up plenty of privacy issues over who determines which keywords are used and what is done with the flagged emails. And while this proposal is probably better than passing a completely new law that would probably be ineffective, the enforcement against this scam may be a bit late as scammers have modified their scams and moved to places other than Nigeria. So scams are here to stay, and although one would hope that public education could take away the incentives for scammers, there's a sucker born every minute.

Sweet Revenge On Nigerian Scammers

Sweet Revenge On Nigerian Scammers 11/16/2003 03:58 PM

Police warning to internet scammers

Police warning to internet scammers 02/07/2005 02:02 AM
ONE News Feb 7 2005 5:54AM GMT

Protecting yourself against moving
company scammers

Protecting yourself against moving
company scammers 06/24/2005 06:20 PM
Mark Frauenfelder: More than a few people I know have told me horror stories about moving companies ripping them off when they've moved to a new house or apartment. Their stories are similar: the moving company loads your stuff on the truck(s) and then it tells you to pay a lot more money than the written estimate. Movingscam.com is an information clearing house about moving company scammers, with tips for finding honest movers.

One thing I should point out, is that the bids from these companies that I have seen often quote you by cubic footage not by weight. If you get a quote that is priced by cubic footage, that should raise a red flag right away. The reason for this is that if they charge you by weight, they have to provide proof of the weight of your belongings at no charge to you. Current laws regarding the moving industry do not cover moves based on cubic feet.

Once the movers show up and most or all of your things are in their truck, they will hit you with the real price of the move. By then it's too late. Your things are on their truck, and they won't get anything off of it without full payment in cash. They will tell you that if you don't pay up, that they will take the truck and sell everything you own to cover the contract. In my case, I put down a $150 deposit, and was told before the movers showed up that the rest of the $1869 would be due on delivery. When the movers showed up, the price jumped to $5012.50, and the movers demanded half of that on the spot or else there wouldn't be a delivery!

Link(via Sensible Erection)

Scammers target Westpac customers

Scammers target Westpac customers 11/02/2003 10:55 PM
ZDNet Australia Nov 2 2003 9:29PM ET

Nigerian Scammers Claim Another Victim

Nigerian Scammers Claim Another Victim 12/24/2003 03:46 PM
A Florida newspaper ran a story yesterday about a local retiree who fell hard for a 419 scam. The story goes into depth on the methods used to play on the ...

TTY services used by Nigerian
credit-card scammers

TTY services used by Nigerian
credit-card scammers 04/10/2004 03:46 AM
TTY relay services are phone-banks staffed by operators who take text messages from the TTY terminals used by deaf people and read them aloud into telephones. This lets deaf people order pizzas, and otherwise interact with the hearing telephony world.

Recently, TTY systems have gone web-based: instead of using specialized TTY hardware, deaf people can use a chat interface in a browser window to interact with the operators.

This fact has not escaped Nigerian credit-card scammers. These folks are piping the output of Babelfish and other machine-translation services into the chat interface and directing the operators to place calls to merchants, directing them to ship goods paid for with stolen credit card numbers to mail-drops.

Merchants stand to lose big if they fall for the ruse - callers often try to order more than $10,000 worth of expensive equipment. People who legitimately use the service fear businesses will stop taking their calls, thinking they are fraud artists...

The only possible beneficiaries are the successful scammers - profiting from free phone calls intended for deaf people - and the four phone companies that provide Internet relay service. They are paid for the calls by the minute.

Link (via /.)

UK Watchdog bites mobile spam scammers

UK Watchdog bites mobile spam scammers 02/19/2004 02:06 PM
Two operations shut down under emergency procedures
Grok Description matches for Online Vigilantes Still Scamming The Scammers
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Law Professor With Three Doctorates
Tricked By Nigerian Scammers

Law Professor With Three Doctorates
Tricked By Nigerian Scammers 01/06/2005 07:34 PM
If anything is clear, it's that the details of this case are not made clear by the AP article about it. However, it appears that a Miami law professor with three doctorates (they don't say what those doctorates are in) was clearly duped in part of a Nigerian scam. The professor continues to disclaim all responsibility saying he was tricked by "the Nigerian government," when it's pretty clear that the tricking was done by scammers who were probably not associated with the government. It also doesn't explain why the professor didn't question why the Nigerian government apparently needed him to deposit a $1.68 million check into his personal account and wire the money on to them. The guy was obviously suckered by the promise of an easy $200,000 (like all other Nigerian scam victims) and tossed any skepticism right out the window. What's not clear from the article, however, is how this scam really worked. It involves Penske, the trucking company, who apparently sent out a $1.68 million check to buy trucks. It's not clear where that check went. That's not explained. Instead, somehow, somewhere, a new, counterfeit check, in the same amount, went from Penske to this professor, starting the process. Penske is now suing Fleet bank and a credit union for letting this happen -- but there are plenty of other questions about how this all happened in the first place. It sounds like someone took the original check for the trucks and altered it, or copied it, replacing the truck company with the professor. If so, then Penske shouldn't be going after the banks, but whoever altered the check and those who ran the scam.

Nigerian scammers 'exploit tsunami
tragedy'

Nigerian scammers 'exploit tsunami
tragedy' 01/04/2005 11:30 PM
ZDNet Australia Jan 5 2005 2:46AM GMT

Pickup Games, Vol. 4 - Kingdom of
Loathing

Pickup Games, Vol. 4 - Kingdom of
Loathing 06/17/2004 07:33 PM

MATT GALLANT -- Today's pickup game is a web game— that is, one implemented entirely through HTML and Javascript that's generated by a lot of clever server-side scripting and database manipulation. It's Kingdom of Loathing, a turn-based RPG. The main focus of the game is humor, with send-ups of popular RPG conventions, as well as internet culture. But unlike a lot of other comical games you can play over the internet, the game underneath the humor is actually very full-featured and has a lot of content. A lot of very funny content.

Click the MORE link below, or suffer a joyless life bereft of comfort or understanding, like a dog in a museum.

Scam Busters Just As Bad As Scam
Victims?

Scam Busters Just As Bad As Scam
Victims? 01/19/2004 05:05 AM
An odd article out of South Africa complaining that scam busters are just as bad as scam victims - in that they act in just as predictable a manner. Of course, the scam busters aren't the folks losing money to the scammers, and, in fact, they often are doing a good job to spread news of a scam to protect potential victims. So, I'm a bit confused as to what's so upsetting about people taking it upon themselves to tell others about a scam. Certainly, there are some things that don't deserve to be publicized, but are, due to the intensity of the efforts against them. However, scams are something that clearly should be publicized to limit the negative impact. It seems that the real complaint of the writer isn't so much scam busters, but "fad" busters who complain about people getting hooked on the latest fad. However, fads and scams are two very different things.

IT Budget Busters?

IT Budget Busters? 02/18/2004 09:24 PM
Defense, security would gain, but other areas would take hits.

Online Vigilantes Still Scamming The Scammers

The following phrases have been identified by the grok system as matching this entry: scamming for fun not for profit scamming the scammers "kingdom of loathing" store "advertising budget" nigerian bank scam busters "scamming the scammers" "brad serling" phone