Huge Phishing Attack On Emissions Trade In Europe

bratgitarre writes "A targeted phishing scam on companies trading with greenhouse gas emission certificates in Europe has reaped millions, Der Spiegel reports. By sending phishing e-mails to companies in Australia and New Zealand purporting to be from the German Ministry for Environmental Protection (German article, Google translation) the criminals obtained login credentials for companies owning polluting permissions. They then swiftly sold them to other polluters in various European countries. Damages are probably huge for a single incident, as 'one medium-sized German company alone had lost allowances worth €1.5 million ($2.1 million).' German federal officials, who can trace some of the transactions, claim that out of 2000 certificate sellers, seven responded to the scam."

Comments

Re:What did they learn?

[Anonymous Coward]

At AA meetings I go to we require two signatures on checks, and our treasuries are in the thousand dollar range. Of course, we do tend to be criminals...

Re:Is it only me

[Kittenman]

I read something that mentioned that Al "Incovenient Truth" Gore had major shareholdings in all companies that dealt in emission tradings, and stood to gain millions as it all got going.

I read it on a flier passed on by a climate skeptic, so I'm not sure if it's the case. Anyone know for sure?