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Criminals Steal House Thanks To Hacked Email

Posted by Soulskill on from the that's-not-a-scam,-THIS-is-a-scam dept.

mask.of.sanity writes with this quote from ZDNet: "An international cybercrime investigation is underway into a sophisticated scam network that used email and fax to sell an Australian man's AU$500,000 property without his knowledge. The man was overseas when the Nigerian-based scammers stole his credentials and amazingly sold two houses through his real estate agent. He rushed home and prevented the sale of his second home from being finalized. Australian Federal Police and overseas law enforcement agencies will investigate the complex scam, which is considered the first of its kind in Australia. It is alleged scammers had stolen the man's email account and personal property documents to sell the houses and funnel cash into Chinese bank accounts. Investigating agencies admit the scammers hoodwinked both the selling agents and the government, and said they had enough information to satisfy regulatory requirements. The police did not rule out if the scammers had links to the man."

9 of 227 comments (clear)

  1. Commission by initials · · Score: 2, Funny

    I doubt the real estate agent will be refunding their commission.

  2. Re:Real Estate Agents.. by AHuxley · · Score: 2, Funny

    Reminds me of the the old Australian comedy show Fast Forward in the early 1990's: "Where your property is our property"
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0QaH0uPlp24

    --
    Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
  3. Oh. XKCD! by thatkid_2002 · · Score: 3, Funny

    http://xkcd.com/792/
    You can add house to that list.

    1. Re:Oh. XKCD! by Kilrah_il · · Score: 2, Funny

      Damn, I was saving it for the next Google story. Bastard!

      --
      Whenever in an argument, remember this.
  4. Were I him, I would... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

    ...chain myself to my water piping and keep the gun cocked. I'm not leaving MY house. It wasn't for sale so you couldn't have bought it not matter what some f'n pieces of paper say. You burn the f'n papers or I burn the f'n house.

  5. Re:This is a non-story. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Funny

    ... an article ...

    http://news.slashdot.org/story/10/09/14/0144207/Criminals-Steal-House-Thanks-To-Hacked-Email

  6. Have we ruled out Carmen Sandiego as the culprit by antifoidulus · · Score: 2, Funny

    I mean Carmen Sandiego and her gang have been known to steal whole monuments, I'm sure a house is a pretty easy job for them.

    --
    Monstar L
  7. Re:Where on Earth.. by bigrockpeltr · · Score: 2, Funny

    After all of this time we have finally found her!!! She's in Nigeria!

    --
    $ unzip, strip, touch, finger, grep, mount, fsck, more, yes,fsck,fsck,fsck,umount, sleep
  8. Re:That's nothing... by ScrewMaster · · Score: 2, Funny

    It wasn't hacked voting machines. It was poorly designed paper ballots.

    Wait. You are talking about the 2000 election, right?

    Yes, and I believe the perpetrator was a guy named Chad. But it's okay ... they caught the bastard and hung him.

    --
    The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.