FBI: Social Media, Virtual Currency Fraud Becoming a Huge Problem

coondoggie writes: Criminals taking advantage of personal data found on social media and vulnerabilities of the digital currency system are two of the emerging Internet law-breaking trends identified by the FBI's Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3) in its annual look at online crime. The IC3 said 12% of the complaints submitted in 2014 contained a social media trait. Complaints involving social media have quadrupled over the last five years. In most cases, victim’s personal information was exploited through compromised accounts or social engineering.

Comments

"Real" currency fraud is not a problem, of course

[X.25]

It's ok, they just slap some silly fine and noone goes to jail.

But virtual currency fraud is a really serious one.

Complaints

[Earthquake Retrofit]

Complaints involving social media have quadrupled over the last five years.

Perhaps usage of online social media has also quadrupled over the last five years.