'Operation Cyber Sweep' Nets 125 Arrests

unassimilatible writes "Attorney General John Ashcroft said Thursday that law-enforcement agents had arrested 125 suspects in a crackdown on Internet crimes ranging from hacking and software piracy to credit card fraud and selling stolen goods over the Internet, according to Wired. The investigation, begun Oct. 1 and dubbed Operation Cyber Sweep, involved police from Ghana to Southern California and uncovered 125,000 victims who had lost more than $100 million. Seventy indictments to date have led to arrests or convictions of 125 people, with more expected as the probe continues. The cases range from a Virginia woman who sent fake e-mails to America Online customers asking them to update their credit card numbers to a disgruntled Philadelphia Phillies fan who hacked into computers nationwide and launched spam e-mails criticizing the baseball team. 'The information superhighway should be a conduit for communication, information and commerce, not an expressway for crime,' Ashcroft said."

Comments

The power of money

[jdifool]

Hi,

let's make some maths together.

• There have been roughly 125 000 people scammed by the 125 arrested scammers. If we just stick to the hypothesis that the average scam lasts for one year (if anyone has more information about that, welcome), it makes a difference of 47 000 (125 000 - 4*3*58000) between the scammed people and the number of complaints.
• Given that the overall loss is estimated to 100 million US, and making a real nice average calculation, we can just imagine that 37,6 million (47 000/125 000*100 million) dollars have not been claimed.

Where will that money go ?

Regards,
jdif

Ashcroft is not all bad

[soft_guy]

When I lived in Missouri I once had a problem with being slammed by various telephone companies (mostly from Texas.)

Slamming is where they change your long distance service from your preferred service to a different one (usually one that charges a very high rate) without your permission.

I didn't know what to do about it and Southwestern Bell's answer was that I should just pay my bill and shut up. So, I called John Ashcroft's office because he was one of my US Senators. Someone at his office made a call to SW Bell on my behalf and voila my problem was solved.

In this case, he has captured people who were actually out comitting crimes against people. These crimes had victims and real consequences. I, for one, applaud this news.

Tomorrow I can go back to fuming about the patriot act. Today, I say "Thank you very much Attorney General Ashcroft for getting some criminals off the internet!"