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Top 10 Internet Crimes of '06

An anonymous reader notes that "The Bad Guys blog at USNews.com offers a look at the top ten Internet crimes of 2006. The federal study cited draws on over 200,000 complaints to US law enforcement and regulatory agencies. Top crime: auction fraud, followed by other online rip-offs. "

13 of 102 comments (clear)

  1. ... and the number 1 "Internet Crime" by EveryNickIsTaken · · Score: 5, Funny
    Internet Explorer 7.

    *rimshot*

  2. Skewed results by orclevegam · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The article mentions that the results are probably skewed by the likes of E-Bay providing direct links to file complaints, and it also doesn't say if the complaints were ever followed up on or not. This is probably a list of all complaints, rather than those that were shown to be legitimate.

    --
    Curiosity was framed, Ignorance killed the cat.
  3. Re:Incredible, though not surprising. by Bicx · · Score: 5, Funny

    eBay is an awesome, secure site, and I really doubt there are that many cases of auction fraud. Where else could I have bought Intel's new 7-core processor? It's arriving sometime this week. w00t!

  4. Bullshit! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    My list of the The top ten internet crimes:
    1. Windows Vista
    2. Microsoft Office
    3. RIAA lawsuits
    4. Slashdot "editors"
    5. Web sites with blinkey flashey ads and two paragraphs per page for a grand total of fifteen blinkey flashey pages I could read in less than two minutes except I have to wait for all the bullshit to load before I can read the next pair of paragraphs. There is a damned good reason they got rid of the <blink> tag, you know!
    6. DMCA. The law itself is a crime
    7. Bono Act (AKA "Steamboat Willie Preservation Act"). Again, the law itself is the crime.
    8. Jack Thompson
    9. Sony's rootkit
    10. Cowboy Neal

  5. I notice by i+kan+reed · · Score: 5, Interesting

    That child pornography accounts for 1% of all internet crime. Yet, somehow, this seems to be the only crime I've heard of the FBI cracking down on. Is this because of skewed news reporting? Or is it because of the relative severity of child pornography? Or is it "thinkofthechildren"ism?

    1. Re:I notice by StewedSquirrel · · Score: 4, Informative

      Would you be surprised to know that almost 50% of those arrested on child porn charges in 2007 are actually minors themselves?

      Most people don't know that. It doesn't tend the make the news since minors charged of a crime don't get press releases in most cases.

      I ran into that in a DoJ study on the issue. It cites broad statistics but doesn't reveal much in the way of details, citing "protecting children" *chuckles*

      Stew

      --
      There are 10 kinds of people in the world. Those who understand binary and those who don't.
  6. There is no such thing as "Internet Crime" by vivaoporto · · Score: 5, Insightful
    There is no such thing as "Internet Crime", and the data presented by this article, according to themselves, is not significant. From TFA:

    The feds caution that these figures don't represent a scientific sample of just how much Net crime is out there. They note, for example, that the high number of auction fraud complaints is due, in part, to eBay and other big E-commerce outfits offering customers direct links to the IC3 website. And it's tough to measure what may be the Web's biggest scourge, child porn, simply by complaints.
    Just take a look at the Top 10 list:

    2006 Top 10 IC3 Complaint Categories (Percent of Total Complaints Received)

    • Auction Fraud (44.9%)
    • Non-delivery (19.0%)
    • Check Fraud (4.9%)
    • Credit/Debit Card Fraud (4.8%)
    • Computer Fraud (2.8%)
    • Confidence Fraud (2.2%)
    • Financial Institutions Fraud (1.6%)
    • Identity Theft (1.6%)
    • Investment Fraud (1.3%)
    • Child Pornography (1.0%)


    Internet is only the communication channel used by the crooks, all the crimes depicted there are good old fashioned real life crimes. Being perpetrated via Internet is only a detail that should be irrelevant when categorizing crimes. What I would really like to see is the ratio of these same crimes perpetrated in real life vs. via internet. That would really be insightful and newsworthy.
  7. Re:I'm still waiting for that . . . by Threni · · Score: 5, Funny

    > Is that considered auction fraud or non-delivery?

    It's an intelligence test. I'm sure the result will show up shortly.

  8. Surprised that the article didn't mention piracy by tepples · · Score: 4, Informative

    3. RIAA lawsuits
    6. DMCA. The law itself is a crime
    7. Bono Act (AKA "Steamboat Willie Preservation Act"). Again, the law itself is the crime. I was looking for those in the article before I read your comment, but I didn't see one instance of any form of "pirate" or "infringe" in the article. So is there a reason that copyright infringement, such as through peer-to-peer file sharing networks, is not one of the top 10 Internet crimes of 2006?

    There is a damned good reason they got rid of the <blink> tag, you know! O RLY? Gecko supports the <blink> element and even has a corresponding CSS attribute for it: text-decoration: blink . Luckily, blinking text in recent Gecko is easier to read than blinking text in older browsers because recent Gecko blinks with a duty cycle of 75 percent on, unlike older browsers that used 50 percent on.
  9. Re:I'm still waiting for that . . . by spamking · · Score: 5, Funny

    A+++++++ Excellent poster. Hope to read more from this guy!! Highly recommended.

  10. Re:Nigerian scam letters by treeves · · Score: 4, Funny

    I've learned about the tragedy of being stuck with $20 million in your bank account and not being able to access it without assistance from a dear kind sir like myself, whom you have the fortune of soliciting in the most urgent case.

    --
    ...the future crusty old bastards are already drinking the Kool-Aid.
  11. Where's Myspace? by Mr.+Underbridge · · Score: 4, Funny

    Surely Myspace has to be considered some sort of ongoing internet crime against decent taste and humanity in general.

  12. Re:Piracy is NOT on the list by bcattwoo · · Score: 4, Informative

    Whenever you see the RIAA whining about how Piracy/IP Theft/Copyright Theft etc. is a major crime, remember this list.
    Piracy is not even in the top ten. Because copyright infringement is a civil matter, not a criminal one.