FBI nabs international “scareware” ring | ESET Threat Blog

[Ceyfer √]

Long a puzzling challenge, the FBI seems to be making strides in tackling international coordinated scams, in this case, scareware. Scareware, the practice of providing fake infection notifications to users’ computers, and then offering to sell solutions to problems that don’t exist, has been quite a boon as of late for fraudsters. FBI claims the current bust uncovered a ring which had bilked customers out of an estimated $72 million. Not bad for a little scammer work, very bad for unsuspecting customers.

What is interesting is manner in which the FBI was able to coordinate the bust with 7 other countries, a none-too-trivial feat. While they were able to seize 22 computers in the U.S., there were also 25 computers in France, Germany, Latvia, Lithuania, the Netherlands, Sweden, and the United Kingdom. The U.S. Justice Department made the announcement, noting that it was a coordinated effort between law enforcement in all the host countries, definitely not a one-man-band.

Source:
http://blog.eset.com/2011/06/24/fbi-...%E2%80%9D-ring

[JayCub]

Good news Ceyfer although a small dent to these scammers it's impressive that countries came together to offer information and coordinate the bust, it is a global problem and their should be no boundries hunting these criminals down, before 2014 every home in Ireland should have internet access the right to information, but at what cost to them.

[Bearcat]

Thanks Ceyfer. I read this story yesterday and was amazed at how much money these scammers were able to extract. It shows just how many uneducated computer users are out there.