Cybercrime takes advantage of both the generative nature of the net, poorly written code and user ignorance. Like all crime, cybercrime has brought about attempts to regulate the Internet, and often these regulations err on the side of caution and over-regulate, limiting beneficial activities. Rampant copyright infringement brought about the DMCA which tried to limit illegal song-swapping, but instead has been used to silence critics or sue adorable kids. And, most likely, it hasn't done a whole lot to stop copyright infringement.

What is at risk with Internet crime is a similar course of events. In briefly reviewing Zittrain's book, Lessig poses the question:

“Whether a single event, or a coordinated event, whether intentional, or accidental, it is simply a matter of time before a catastrophic network event happens. And when it happens — think of it as a kind of i9/11 event, but the bad guys are not Al-Qaeda — will we be prepared for the inevitable iPatriot Act response? Are we better prepared than civil libertarians were when we were hit with the USA Patriot Act? Have we even framed the right debate?”

Arguably this over-regulation has already started to take place, but it could certainly get worse. To help flesh out some of the important ideas about the future of cybercrime, the Publius Project has commissioned three essays.

Michael Barrett, head of information security at PayPal, writes that the impetus for regulation of cars and airplanes were prominent accidents. Paul Starr tells a similar story in The Creation of the Media about the beginning of radio regulation. Following the sinking of the Titanic, the Radio Act of 1912 required all radio operators to be licensed, all ships to have transmitters and allocated bands of spectrum for certain purposes. Barrett thinks that cybercrime will have the same effect that the Titanic did and be the cause of serious government regulation of the Internet. In fact, he welcomes it as an important part of the interconnecting regulation needed from government, private industry and users.

First of all, it is not clear that cybercrime will be able to have the dramatic effects that a sinking Titanic did. Many of the threats from online activity, especially identity theft, are well-known and publicized. Others are becoming more publicized, like Internet-facilitated espionage. These cybercrimes will not necessarily serve as the shock that government needs to begin regulation. But, let's say there is an event or series of events which are powerful enough to induce government response, like Barrett welcomes and Lessig fears, is that the right response?

Cybercrime, as best we know, is not centralized. There is no capital city to bomb, leaders to sanction or even mob boss to imprison. As security expert Bruce Schneier says, even the alleged Chinese spy-hackers are not controlled by the state. So, what the cyber-police or other government regulation would be up against is a distributed network of criminals - a classic starfish - and one does not combat decentralized organizations in the same manner as centralized ones. As The Starfish and the Spider points out, to beat a decentralized foe, in this case, cybercrime, one must decentralized oneself, centralize the opponent or change the ideology. In this light, Barrett's assertion that "it’s quite possible that a new global governance organization is needed" seems misguided. While I welcome his support of a shared responsibility between stakeholders, I am fearful that calling for government regulation may be regrettable.

Instead, the words of Internet guru David Clark seem more nuanced:

So the starting point for improving the state of Internet security must be a social dialog, not just a technical dialog, about what sort of Internet we want. The challenge to the technical community is not to build a very secure Internet—that might be more of a price than we actually want to pay. The challenge is to find clever ways to give us more security without taking away our freedom of action. And finding these better solutions will require a design process that involves both technologists and social observers, because it will take both technical imagination and social imagination to conceive of a different Internet from what we have today, more secure but still suited to our desires for open, diverse access.

This social dialog should recognize the power of defaults and architect a security-bias. Beau Brendler, in his essay, embraces this by calling for simple solutions which "nudge," to use Sunstein and Thaler's expression, users towards more secure computing. Provide free anti-virus software and simple-to-understand security manuals, for one.

But if these soft-power solutions are to emerge, they had better do so quickly because while mainstream media rhetoric on the issues may border on panicked, those who know best are worried, too. And if we are to save the open, generative net, it will need saving from both itself and outside regulation.

I saw an ad on Cragislist that smelled wrong, so I requested more info.  Less than 24 hours later, Lori J. Stevenson responded with her scam offer.  I wrote about her and her company back in May - remember EFU Limited?

Basically they post ads, then when applicants respond, they hit them with the 'pay us $24.95 (or whatever) for processing fees.'

This line of bull kills me -

This is just a small processing fee, protecting
from those who are not serious about doing this work. No business can
cover administrative cost, wasted time or provide costly materials to
everyone who inquires about this position. If this is not acceptable
for you, or you cannot afford this small cost, please disregard this email.

The 'costly materials' she refers to?  An email telling the applicant how to scam people the same way she is.  Wait, not 'scam,' but explanation of your work duties.

If you'd like to read the entire email, drop me a line and I'll forward you a copy.  Remember, this is a scam, not a job.

As long as I can, I will nail these scamming beotches to the wall.  I'll shout from the rooftoops about who they are, how they scam, and how to avoid them.

Be safe out there!

1. What Is Data
2. What Is Information?
3. What Is Database?
4. What Is Database management system (DBMS) ?
5. What Is Flat-File and Relational Database Structures
6. What Is Fields, Records, Tables?
7. What Is Microsoft Access?
8. What Is Development Phases?
9. What Is Primary key?
10. Who Is Hacker? How Hacker Can Attack You?
11. How To Use Firewall On Best Way?
12. What Is Cookies, Webbugs, Spy ware?
13. What do you understand about "Public records On The Internet"?
14. Power related threats? Threats Identity?
15. Virus Cybercribe, Malware?
16. How To Deal With Cookies?
17. Why Organization Need Information System?
18. Potential Risk Of Information System?
19. Characteristics Of Information?
20. Pyramid Structure Vs Task Based Structure?
21. Computer Literacy Vs Information Literacy?
22. Data Vs Information?
23. Database Vs Database Management System?
24. Information System & Information Technologies?
25. Lots of things...More on Tags :P
    

Some Griefing can be akin to real world peaceful protesters however like phishing & viruses which are created by mainly criminals for monetary gain, Virtual Worlds are susceptible to criminal intent. Virtual Worlds like Twinity which is offering REAL world experiences in a Virtual 3D Online environment will need to develop and deploy monitoring and protective services either in partnership or directly to protect its members from criminals and Griefers alike. Article excerpt below:

The Griefer Future

Jamais Cascio

Griefing is, simply put, making someone else’s online game session miserable. It’s not simply beating someone in player-vs.-player competitions, or even annoying someone as the side-effect of otherwise game-focused actions. Griefing means taking action intended to harm the game-play of someone else—these can include attacking someone ostensibly on your own team, blocking passageways, intentionally crashing your vehicle into someone else’s, leading masses of monsters to attack unsuspecting players (”training”), using known software bugs to force another player to “crash out” of the game, and so forth. While many of these might happen by accident, griefing is all about intent.

Read more: IEET

Originally there were no criminal charges filed against the Drews since investigators found that their actions, while cruel, did not break any laws. However, a little over a month ago, Lori Drew was indicted under a criminal computer fraud statute. The theory of the case is that when Drew registered the account for "Josh" on MySpace, she agreed to provide truthful and accurate information and refrain from promoting anything intentionally misleading. Because she violated this agreement, the federal government was able to charge her with conspiracy to access MySpace without authorization.

Clever, huh? In a way, this seems right - a loophole in the law to allow some consequences for intentional cruelty, some justice for a dead girl. After all, the public outcry about this case was huge - according to the New Yorker article, the local police received phone calls from as far away as India begging them to do something. It is a highly sympathetic case.

But the thing about the law is that a single case sets a precedent. Whether a reward or a pitfall of a common law system, you decide - but in this case, it seems clear that a highly sympathetic set of facts could make very, very bad law. The danger is this: that every terms-of-service violation is a federal crime. Considering that the majority of people don't even read a TOS contract before clicking through it, they might as well lock us all up right now (between that and the RIAA music downloading cases, they may run out of space soon, though).

Remember how the feds finally got Al Capone for tax evasion of all things? Well, as the WSJ law blog pointed out, now all the government has to do is prove someone violated some random website's TOS in order to have an excuse for criminal charges. I think that everyone feels for poor Megan, but I wish they could have made some sort of harassment charges stick to Drew instead.

In the meantime, just in case? You may want to make sure you're not lying about your favorite book on your Facebook page just to make yourself look smarter.

Jack Conway, who created a special unit to fight cybercrime, has become the victim of identity theft.

Conway tried to buy some music on Itunes but the glorious Apple empire declared that he didn’t live at his home any more.

After an investigation, Conway discovered someone had stolen his credit card number and charged thousands of dollars worth of computers, Vonage phone service and postal service charges to it. The ID thieves also changed his billing address.

Unfortunately for the thieves, they might have picked the wrong bloke to hack off.

The cybercrime unit he created will almost certainly make it a top priority to arrest someone. Anyone they catch will almost certainly never be able to cop a plea to anything short of a long stretch in the worst prison in the State. µ

Sentencing postponed

The sentencing hearing for a Fox River Grove teenager convicted last month of falsely making a terrorist threat against Stevenson High School was postponed Thursday. Jeremie Dalin faces up to 15 years in prison for posting the threat on a Web site last fall. The sentencing had been scheduled for Thursday afternoon in Lake County circuit court but was called off. No information was available about a new date.

Read his modus operandi here.

For the same cases posted on TPC forums posted by his victims, go to:

http://tipidpc.com/forums.php

and seach for the forum topics "scammer" and "beware" then you will find results about his modus operandi.

All Ricky, 16, knows is the fuzzy yet distinguishable portrait of him in English class showed up on MySpace, on a page that claimed to be his. And the fake profile, titled "The Rictionary," not only identified his school (more ...)

Dirty deeds done dirt cheap

Hackers are now professionals using white boards, pie charts and spouting words like 'paradigm', 'cash cow', and 'model'.

A report from web security outfit called Finjan claims that the days of the lone hacker who steals and resells credit card numbers is a thing of the past.

Hacks for fame have been replaced by the concept of creating a business where you have frequent customers who buy your stolen product.

Finjan staff went under cover by pretending to be potential customers and found that cybercrime outfits have a structure much like the Mafia.

There is a 'boss' who is a business entrepreneur and doesn't commit the crimes himself, with an 'underboss' who manages the operation. The number two sometimes provides the software tools. Then there are 'campaign managers' who lead their own attacks to steal data with their 'affiliation networks'.

Stolen data is sold by 'resellers', similar to the Mafia's 'associates'. Since these individuals did not partake in the actual cybercrime, they know nothing about the original attacks.

Stolen credit cards and bank accounts are cheap while stolen healthcare-related information, login credentials for organisations, e-mail, and FTP accounts are more expensive.

Related: Lori Drew's indictment, May 2008

A 19-year-old New Zealander called Owen Thor Walker was accused of designing software to steal millions of dollars from bank accounts. He has escaped conviction, although he pleaded guilty and he may be offered a job by the police, as the latter are interested in using the hacker's knowledge in the fight against cybercrime.

Owen Thor Walker was arrested in November 2007 because he was accused of leading a hacking gang that stole USD 24 million from victims worldwide. He designed software which was used by the gang to install malicious software on computers and steal usernames, passwords and credit card details.

According to the New Zealand police, Walker was hired by the gang to design the software to be used to access people's bank accounts. He did not directly take money from people's bank accounts. The police are interested in using the hacker's knowledge in the fight against cybercrime and thus, he may be offered a job within this institution.

There is no better way to get a blogger talking than by telling him what he cannot publish — although you might forgive a government prosecutor for thinking otherwise.

A grand jury subpoena sent by prosecutors in the Bronx earlier this year sought information to help identify people blogging anonymously on a Web site about New York politics called Room 8.

The subpoena carried a warning in capital letters that disclosing its very existence “could impede the investigation being conducted and thereby interfere with law enforcement” — implying that if the bloggers blabbed, they could be prosecuted. (go to the full article)

Cyber-bullying is rising as "netizens" find it easier-and-easier to post photos and videos on social-networking websites and harass victims. A report by the University of New Hampshire's Crimes Against Children Research Center says the number of young Americans between the ages 10 to 17 who experienced online harassment increased 50 percent from 2000 to 2005. (to the full article)

Cyberbullying is becoming so prevalent in Canadian schools and society it should be made a separate Criminal Code offence, according to a new policy that will be adopted Saturday by the Canadian Teachers' Federation.

The CTF, which represents 220,000 teachers, is holding a special session on cyberbullying at its annual meeting in Moncton, N.B., where the plan will officially be ratified.

In a draft version of the policy obtained by Canwest News Service, the teachers' group says it should be a punishable offence to use "information and communication technology to convey a message which threatens death or bodily harm or perpetuates fear and intimidation."

The proposal indicates a serious recognition of how common it is now for bullying to be carried out by text messaging, in online chat rooms, on blogs or social networking websites such as Facebook.

The idea goes far beyond the expulsions and suspensions that some students have been punished with for bullying fellow students or targeting teachers.

The president of the CTF, Emily Noble, said in an interview the Criminal Code doesn't delve far enough into the use of electronic media and the legislation needs to be toughened.

"Cyberbullying is very pervasive and it is, from my perspective, devastating on employees and on students and we need to do something about it," said Noble, who acknowledged that asking for cyberbullying to be made a crime is a strong statement.

"It's pushing government to put some legislation that has some teeth."

An aide to Manitoba Education Minister Peter Bjornson said the minister is not taking a position on the teachers' proposal, but added, "We welcome any efforts that would strengthen protection for students."

Bjornson recently introduced amendments to the Public Schools Act that defined cyberbullying and directed school divisions to include it in their codes of conduct. However, the province has not called for cyberbullying to be a separate criminal offence.

Winnipeg School Division board chairwoman Kristine Barr said Thursday the division has been in the forefront of toughening up its code of conduct to target cyberbullying specifically.

"We take cyberbullying very seriously. Cyberbullying is a growing problem. We will discipline students under our progressive discipline policy," which allows principals to suspend students for up to five days, superintendents to suspend students for up to five weeks, and for trustees to suspend beyond five weeks or expel a student altogether.

Barr, who is a lawyer, said she would want to read specifically what the teachers are advocating, but said,"there may already be mechanisms in place" within the Criminal Code dealing with threats, which would cover cyberbullying.

A spokesman for Federal Justice Minister Rob Nicholson said it's too early to comment on the teachers' Criminal Code proposal, but Noble said the CTF has started to talk to members of Parliament and have so far found a receptive audience.

"It is an issue that will resonate, we believe, with the policy-makers and the legislative-makers," she said.

According to a poll conducted for the CTF that is being released today, a majority of Canadians agree with the CTF.

Results show 34 per cent of Canadians say they knew of students in their community who had been the target of a cyberbully in the previous year, while one in five knew a teacher who had been cyberbullied.

Click on the above screenshot to go to the actual court record.

SURREY, B.C. — Cyber crime has a new enemy.

Simon Fraser University launched an International Cybercrime Research Centre on Tuesday, saying child pornography will be its first target with a type of "good virus" that scours systems with the tenacity of a chomping Pac Man character.

"In the same way that a bad virus works by infecting machines, by hunting for certain symbols, so a good virus can operate in much the same way," said the centre's new director, Robert Gordon. "Like Pac-Man, actually starting to destroy particular forms of imagery on the Internet."

Gordon said they are already experimenting with the virus in some operating systems.

There are about 14 million pornography websites in operation today, and B.C. Labour Minister Iain Black pointed out it's estimated there are about one million child abuse images contained inside those websites.

"I am very, very pleased the centre will be working to protect children," Black told a crowd gathered at the Surrey, B.C., campus of the university.

Black announced provincial government support of $350,000 to help set up and operate the centre, as well as secure data and purchase lab equipment.

The B.C. government operates one of the largest Internet networks in North America, with 750,000 users.

While child pornography and identity theft are considered the most serious cyber crimes, the centre will also do research on criminal harassment through the Internet, money laundering, economic crimes and computer viruses.

Black compared the problem to the many-headed creature Hydra in Greek mythology.

"Each time you chop one (head) off another one appears. It happens in this case because the profits for criminals are absolutely enormous," he said.

Black quoted a recent Canadian survey that found more Canadians believe they're likely to be victims of Internet crime than they would be victims of crime on the street.

Many people ignore or delete requests for money, their bank account information or credit card numbers, but the mass quantities of illegal requests going out means that some people do send information to criminals.

Gordon believes that getting the word out about these scams will be a key priority for the centre.

"It's the same old confidence trickery that's been going around for about 500 years, but it's just in this new mode," he explained.

Gordon said in the last few days he has received similar requests from criminals and simply deleted them.

He said the centre will also focus on crime detection and helping to prosecute those responsible, a difficult predicament when the person accused of committing the crime is likely in another country.

"That requires international agreements around investigations and such proceedings," Gordon said.

Vancouver Police Insp. Kevin McQuiggan, of the forensic services section, said the centre is an excellent way to collaborate on these types of crimes.

"I think it goes beyond the police, and that police and industry and academia all have to work together to address the problem."

The centre will also investigate crime trends and help establish new tools to counter constantly changing Internet crimes.

Harvard Law School resumed bar exam review classes Tuesday after a threat posted on an online message board forced officials to cancel sessions the day before, the Harvard Crimson reports. The post, which was accompanied by an image of a gun and ammo read "On Monday, I am bringing my piece and his brother to class. [Dean] Elena Kagan and all those arseholes are going to pay. THEY WILL PAY ATTENTION!"

Although officials are confident the threat has dissipated, the school continues to step up foot patrols, with the help of federal authorities.

Here is the original thread posted on 4chan.org:

(The original threat was deleted from 4chan.org, a copy is at http://img237.imageshack.us/img237/9056/hlsshootingsr0.gif)

In the early hours of June 27, 2008, two very popular Hip-Hop musical websites were attacked by individuals calling themselves “Anonymous”. MTV News reported that: “Both companies' sites were hacked, and instead of the usual hip-hop related news articles and feature stories, readers were shocked to find fake headlines and obviously photoshopped pictures saturated with racial slurs and other offensive terms; the hackers also stole personal information about employees of SOHH.com. A group or individual going by the name "Anonymous" has claimed responsibility.”

The CEO of SOHH.com, one of the attacked sites with over 1.5 million visitors per month, issued a statement, saying:

"It appears that hackers are specifically targeting Black, Hispanic, Asian and Jewish youth who ascribe to hip-hop culture. … Other websites, including AllHipHop and DatPiff forums have also been compromised or threatened this week. ... Also, as this is an international issue, it is being addressed by the FBI and the Strategic Alliance Cyber Crime Working Group."

The sites were defaced with Nazi symbols and targeted the Black community whose members regularly frequent the site for news.

Fake headlines (“JEWS DID 9/11 – Enjoy This White Wimmens, N*gger”)

Fake headlines (“DEAD BEAT NIGRA ORDERED TO PAY 40K IN NIGLET SUPPORT) and racist pictures.

Promoting slavery

Racist comments and pictures

Early research found that the attack had been planned and promoted on 411chan.org where a “Call to Arms” was published on 411chan.org on 23 June 2008:

(nao : slang for now. irc: Internet Relay Chat. A real-time communication system on the internet used for chatting or live coordination of events).

The call for support was posted on a website called 411chan.org, a meeting place of the internet group "Anonymous" especially targeting Black people and minorities.

The systems of SOHH.com were damaged sufficiently to leave the site inaccessible for a week. Also the other attacked sites stayed partially disconnected from the internet.

EncyclopediaDramatica.com, a primary site of Anonymous chronicling the online activities of internet hackers on 4chan.org and 411chan.org, announced on 30 June 2008 that they will continue their “fight against niggers”:

“SOHH.com is a place for gay wiggers [slang: wanna-be niggers] to talk about cRap music using their native tounge of nigger language. Sohh.com is one of the highest-ranked online hip-Hop communities ....

“However, Anonymous has no regard for one's material gains or how "nannified" a racial demographic is -- Anonymous only exists to destroy. That lesson has been made abundantly clear to SOHH.com. …

“As SOHH is down, the leader of the Pro-Nigger Faction started a secondary ‘instead-of-SOHH’ site … The registrations are currently closed, but many of our soldiers managed to get in before the closing. As a result of this, there are currently operations underway to make sure this site does not achieve any sort of prosperity.” (Source: http://encyclopediadramatica.com/SOHH)

(What Anonymous thinks of Black people. Source: www.encyclopediadramatice.com/Nigga)

A STUDENT who allegedly posted a United States shoot-to-kill hoax on the internet will face court on separate charges next week.

Jarrad Willis, 20, has been charged with criminal defamation and could face up to 10 years in jail if found guilty.

The charge does not relate to the hoax, but to circulating an email and is one of more than 70 charges that have been laid against the Frankston South philosophy student in the past 12 months.

Mr Willis made headlines late last year after it was alleged he posted an online threat to carry out a mass shooting at a shopping centre near Beverly Hills, Los Angeles.

The posting was accompanied by a picture of a man holding a shotgun and came hours after a gunman killed eight shoppers in Omaha, Nebraska.

Los Angeles Police Department counter-terrorism bureau deputy chief Michael Downing said it seemed the "hoax" on the 4chan.org internet bulletin board was a "sick joke".

On December 7, 2007, Mr Willis was questioned and had his home searched by police as part of a global investigation.

More than 100 international counter-terrorism police were involved, but it is understood no charges have been laid in relation to the alleged hoax.

Victoria Police spokeswoman Anna Erbrederis said the computer crime squad was investigating and could not comment.

The Leader has previously reported police were also investigating Mr Willis over matters relating to eBay.

Detectives have brought more than 30 charges against Mr Willis.

Many of them relate to deception.

Mr Willis is due to appear before Frankston Magistrates' Court on July 9.

AllHipHop.com (WARNING! Graphic!)

Sources: EncyclopediaDramatica.com/SOHH and trillsouth.com

SOHH.com is is still down as of 30 June 08 and also Allhiphop.com could not be accessed all weekend.

Here is the official statement from Felicia Palmer, CEO of SOHH.com, about what happened:

As many of you are already aware, SOHH.com has been under attack by hackers this week. We noticed the first wave of attacks in our vBulletins forums and as of this morning the whole site was compromised.
It appears that hackers are specifically targeting Black, Hispanic, Asian and Jewish youth who ascribe to hip hop culture. Other websites, including AllHipHop and Da Piff forums, have also been compromised or threatened this week.

We are managing this situation on several fronts. We have taken down the server to patch the security breach and put in protections for future attacks. Also, as this is an international issue, it is being addressed by The FBI and the Strategic Alliance Cyber Crime Working Group.

We realize the hackers attacked SOHH.com because of our stature in the hip hop space and the people we serve. Unfortunately, we did a poor job of protecting SOHH.com from imminent threats from people who hate our community simply because of our racial and ethnic makeup.

This has brought to light our vulnerabilities and those of the internet publisher and users as a whole. What’s possible now is for us to join together to identify and eliminate this threat.
If you are under attack and have any information about these attacks please submit a report to the FBI cyber crimes unit here: https://complaint.ic3.gov/

http://www.trillsouth.com/blog/news/sohh-hacked/

http://www.encyclopediadramatica.com/SOHH

http://thekaoseffect.com/blog/?p=1703