Tougher Times for Hackers and Phishers

November 17th, 2008 | Posted in web news

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2008 is looking like a good year for federal authorities who are cracking down on some of the largest Internet crime rings.

For example, the secret service and FBI have been working to break up a huge forum for stolen credit cards and shut down the world’s largest spam ring. In addition, investigations have to led to indictments of other high-profile spammers and 11 people connected to the computer break-in at TJX and other retailers.

Although the Secret Service and the FBI don’t offer annual cybercrime data, there is no doubt that high profile arrests are substantially up this year. This is attributed to stronger laws, better-trained agents and prosecutors, and more cooperation from crime fighting agencies overseas.

As any other crime, cybercrime goes up during economic downturns, which highlights the importance of the policing activity that is currently taking place. Cybercrime has an estimated value of $200 billion.

What aids the current crime fighting activities is: 1) more resources - an understanding of the technology and how to infiltrate various crime groups. The Secret Service has increased the training for its agents, as well as prosecutors and federal judges. Approximately 1000 more agents are trained compared to last year. 2) International cooperation- There is increased cooperation with other countries such as Romania, Turkey, Germany. In Romania, for example, 90 people have been arrested by the local police cooperating with US authorities. 3) Harsher cyberlaws - Such laws as the Identity Theft Enforcement and Restitution Act of 2008 have helped in prosecuting and sentencing more cybercriminals than ever.

Tech companies are also fighting cybercrime. MySpace filed 5 lawsuits this year against spammers, one of which ended up with a record $230 million judgement for violating the federal anti-spam law.

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