Massive Online ID Fraud Ring Busted

Iphtashu Fitz writes "CNet News is reporting that the US Secret Service in conjunction with authorities in six foreign countries have arrested 28 people in the last 48 hours on charges of identity theft, computer fraud, credit card fraud and conspiracy. Dubbed Operation Firewall, the Secret Service identified a group of people who stole over 1.7 million credit card numbers as well as a passport-forging facility in Bulgaria. The investigation started in July 2003 when the Secret Service began investigating an unspecified financial crime. They identified the website Shadowcrew.com whose members traded tutorials and information about identity theft and forgery and exchanged sensitive personal and financial information. The Shadowcrew website has since undergone a makeover thanks to the Secret Service. A press release about the operation can also be found on their website."

Comments

ShadowCrew "Joe Jobs"

[alanw]

Shadowcrew has its very own entry in the Snopes Urban legends page, after being the subject of "Joe-Job" e-mails claiming that "your credit card has been charged $149.95 for child pornography"

One can only wonder who was responsible. A rival group of fraudsters perhaps, or someone trying to bring them into further disrepute?

Re:Jurisdiction

[tristan-jt2]

I'm not a US citizen, so I may well be mistaken, but the USSS is part of the Department of Treasury. One of their better known mission is to deal with couterfeit money (beside of protecting the POTUS).

Since ID theft has the potential of screwing up the financial system in a rather major way, I'm not too surprised they got involved on that case.

Anyway, the idea of "defacing" the site was bloddy brilliant. It gives the strong message that the Law can get to the frauders level in order to catch them. I'm pretty sure the message got through to a few people in a much stronger way than a simple press release would have.

Re:Jurisdiction

[bani]

the secret service investigate and prosecute forgery. read it on their web site:

http://www.secretservice.gov/investigations.shtm l

"The Secret Service was established as a law enforcement agency in 1865. While most people associate the Secret Service with Presidential protection, our original mandate was to investigate the counterfeiting of U.S. currency--which we still do . Today our primary investigative mission is to safeguard the payment and financial systems of the United States. This has been historically accomplished through the enforcement of the counterfeiting statutes to preserve the integrity of United States currency, coin and financial obligations. Since 1984, our investigative responsibilities have expanded to include crimes that involve financial institution fraud, computer and telecommunications fraud, false identification documents, access device fraud, advance fee fraud, electronic funds transfers, and money laundering as it relates to our core violations."