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The Long Arm of Microsoft

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the new-badge-wearer-in-town dept.

eldavojohn writes "Software giant Microsoft is helping the law track down and find phishers and political borders are no boundary for them. From the article, 'One court case in Turkey has already led to a 2.5-year prison sentence for a so-called "phisher" in Turkey, and another four cases against teenagers have been settled out of court, Microsoft said on Wednesday, eight months after it announced the launch of a Global Phishing Enforcement Initiative in March.' This initiative started back in March and has resulted in 129 lawsuits in Europe & the Middle East. Perhaps their legions of lawyers will come to some use for the rest of us but teenagers settling out of court? That reeks of RIAA/MPAA tactics to me."

5 of 136 comments (clear)

  1. Article Bias by icedivr · · Score: 2, Interesting

    The statement that people are reacting to is "... the civil lawsuits are aimed mainly at young people without criminal intent." But you have to ask yourself, who's the author, what their bias, andy how did they decide that these young people DON'T have criminal intent. I didn't read anything to substantiate the author's statement.

  2. WGA finally useful. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Finally, WGA put to good use. Remember, WGA will not collect any personal information....

  3. Lottery scam (419) by pe1chl · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I forwarded a couple of "You have won the Microsoft Lottery" 419 scams to their abuse address but they don't appear to be interested.
    I get a reply that I should contact the local police. As if I would be interested to waste my time.
    It is *their* name that gets abused, and I help them by forwarding scam mails they can use as evidence, but that is all the effort I am going to make.

  4. Re:Your PD uses a lot more than just MS products. by foobsr · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I doubt that will have much impact on where most of the phishing originates, though, which is overseas.

    If we believe this map and if we are African, Australian or Eurasian, overseas is indeed worst.

    CC.

    --
    TaijiQuan (Huang, 5 loosenings)
  5. Huge problem by NineNine · · Score: 2, Interesting

    You'd have to be asleep for the past 10 years to not know that crime is absolutely out of control online, in the forms of phishing, spam, kiddie porn, etc. No law enforcement agency on the planet is able to do anything to stop it: All we get is one high profile case every 6 months or so on the major media in some kind of pathetic attempt to show that the law enforcement agencies are on top of it. I think that in this case, law enforcement needs all the help they can get.

    Sure, everybody is still entitled to all of their rights (trial by a jury, etc.), but we desperately need more people and companies helping law enforcement in this area, because law enforcement is doing *nothing* right now to stop all of this shit from happening.