FBI Cracks "Largest Phishing Case Ever"

nk497 writes "The FBI and Egyptian authorities have arrested 100 people in what they're calling 'the largest international phishing case ever conducted' as part of a wide-scale investigation called Operation Phish Phry. The criminals used phishing to get access to hundreds of bank accounts, stealing $1.5 million. 'This international phishing ring had a significant impact on two banks and caused huge headaches for hundreds, perhaps thousands of bank customers,' said Acting US Attorney George S. Cardona."

Comments

Is this related to the next story?

[ubrgeek]

The one about "Why the FBI Director Doesn't Bank Online"?

Best use of money?

[yamfry]

They spent 2+ years of US and Egyptian government resources to prosecute 100 people for tricking other people out of 1.5 million dollars. They will spend more resources on each of the 100 peoples' court cases. If their cases hold up in court they will spend more government resources to keep them in jail for up to 20 years each. They didn't state a dollar amount spent on this initiative in TFA, but wouldn't it be more efficient to use that money to educate online banking users on how to avoid phishing scans?

Re:Best use of money?

[Hinhule]

My bank has had this for years.

To log on you enter your SSN, you get a random number. You take your pass generator, enter the pin then the random number number. You get a new number which you use as the password.
Also, new recipients must be authenticated in the same way, which makes it much less likely a program running on your computer can add a transaction once you have logged on.

Re:Best use of money?

[Bigbutt]

I'd expect higher level managerial types to be just as likely as the average Joe on the street really. There's nothing technically special about managers. Heck, my wife has been just as close to falling for a phishing scam. Maybe he has a postit note on his monitor too. The one that says "Don't click on links in e-mails!" :)

[John]

Hope those 'BOA' Phishes I forwarded helped

[david.emery]

I was pretty religious about forwarding all the phishing emails I got purporting to be from Bank of America to BOA's fraud line.

Lately I'm getting swamped by IRS phishes "notice of underreported income" (perhaps 100 of them so far), that I've been sending to the phishing mailbox at irs.gov. Hopefully that'll help close that particular scheme.

How about capital punishment for widespread internet fraud???

Problem with this business model is...

[hesaigo999ca]

They let this go on, because they think the cost of ruining a few lives is ok, as long as in the end they make their bust and all is ok in coptown. Problem is , real time transactions are happening while they study the case, and letting 1.5 million slip through in order to follow the trace back to the top. Like a guy holding a camera while someone is being mugged by a lynch mob and doing nothing, should there not also be consequences especially when FEDS (of all people) let something like this happen,
when they have the power to stop it in its tracks....instead of letting it go on, and on, how long was this case going on for...?

Hard decisions, but sometimes the ends do not justify the means.
I had a ticket once for running through a stop sign, although it was covered almost 100% behind a tree, as I mentioned this to the cop, they told me to just say that in court as they knew many people would run through, instead of just telling the city to fix the problem....however I felt very frustrated, should there have been a kid playing nearby and I had not seen the sign, I would have maybe run him over by accident, then the cop would have been responsible for his life being lost, because instead of directing traffic (like when an intersection is burned out) they were using the hidden stop sign to generate revenue....very depressing!