In China, Censorship is Called Security

Senator Sam Brownback (Kansas) is warning that China is planning to mount a massive espionage operation on guests staying at major hotels during the upcoming Olympic Games next month.This shouldn't surprise anyone. Although they consistently deny it, China has a history of spying on both business and government visitors. They also consistently get accused by governments around the world of hacking into sensitive systems.Recently, there was a lot of speculation that Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez's laptop was hacked during a visit to China...

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Fraud, Greed and Special Interests in the Mortgage Crisis Cost Everybody

(Actual photo of an an allegedly remodeled condo courtesy of the FBI)If you think the factors that enabled the mortgage crisis have been fixed, think again. An example of this might be the Tennessee minister (Reverend Steve Young)-- awaiting sentencing after pleading guilty to mail and wire fraud to commit mortgage fraud -- who was recently rearrested...

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DNS Cache Poisoning Opens Doors for Internet Criminals

The electronic universe seems to get more dangerous all the time. A new systems vulnerability called DNS Cache Poisoning might allow an Internet bad guy (or gal) to redirect you to a malicious site without your knowledge. In the majority of instances, malicious sites are designed to steal personal and financial information.DNS Cache Poisoning is a flaw in what is referred to as the domain name system (DNS) that allows domain names like "Walmart.com" to be changed into numeric code. In layman's terms, this makes it easier for networking hardware...

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Will One Spam King's Conviction and Another's Escape Mean Less E-Trash on the Internet?

Robert Soloway dubbed the "Spam King" was sentenced in Washington yesterday, according to an article in the Seattle Intelligencer.For his misdeeds, Soloway was sentenced to just under four years. Notably, Soloway was the second person to be prosecuted under the Can-Spam Act. It should also be noted that the prosecutors asked for about twice the time in prison and with good behavior, Soloway will probably only serve about half of the sentence he received.Like most of the many "Spam Kings" out there, Soloway allegedly used a botnet (army of zombie...

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E-Gold Admits Being Guilty of Enabling Internet Criminal Activity

According to an article in UPI, the three principal executives of E-Gold Limited have pleaded guilty in a case brought against them by the Department of Justice.The three executives in question, Dr. Douglas Jackson, principal director of E-Gold and CEO of Gold & Silver Reserve Incorporated, and two of his senior directors (Barry Downey and Reid Jackson) pleaded guilty to conspiring to engage in money laundering and operating an unlicensed money transmitting business.The corporations involved (E-Gold and Silver Reserve) face a fine of $3.7 million...

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Rapper DMX Charged With Medical Identity Theft

Earl Simmons a.k.a. DMX -- a rap artist who seems to run afoul of the law frequently -- was arrested in a Phoenix mall on Saturday for identity theft.Apparently, DMX used the name Troy Jones when seeking medical care for pneumonia, according to KNXV-TV in Phoenix. He also used a social security number that didn't belong to him. Allegedly, DMX did this...

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IT Policy Compliance Group Issues 2008 Report on Best Practices

(Courtesy of ITpolicycompliance.com)The IT Policy Compliance Group just released their annual report on the state of affairs of what they refer to as IT governance, risk and compliance (IT GRC).The goal of the group is to promote the development of research and information to assist IT and Finance professionals meet their organization's policy and...

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UC Irvine Staff Nails ID Thief in Texas

A former UnitedHealthCare worker, who stole the personal and financial information of at least 1100 University of California, Irvine students has been arrested in Dallas, Texas. Michael Tyrone Thomas, of Fort Worth, was arrested at his home and is being held on $300,000 bail. The authorities are alleging Thomas stole the information while working at UnitedHealthCare in December 2007. They are also charging that Thomas used the information to fill out fraudulent tax returns using 163 identities stolen in the caper. According to the Houston Chronicle,...

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DOD Analyst Convicted for Selling Information to China

Despite a lot of official denials, it seems pretty clear the Chinese have no qualms about stealing as much intellectual property as they can get their hands on.On Friday, the Department of Justice announced that one Gregg William Bergersen of Alexandria, Virginia was sentenced to 57 months in prison (plus three years of supervised release) for disclosing secret information to a naturalized American citizen of Chinese descent (Tai Shen Kuo), who was then providing it to the People's Republic of China.In his day job, Gregg Bergersen was a Department...

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Stolen Identities Used to File Tax Returns Grows 644 percent

The latest news in the identity theft arena is a statistic showing that IRS related identity theft has grown 644 percent in the past four years.Nina Olson, the National Taxpayer Advocate, warned Congress in a report that identity theft is becoming one of the biggest issues facing taxpayers today. The two main reasons cited were identities stolen to file fraudulent refunds and to obtain employment.As more pressure is being placed on employers to ensure their employees have a social security number that matches a name, more illegal immigrants are...

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California Lottery Nails Dishonest Retailers

When you cash in a small lottery prize at a lottery retailer, the amount might not exactly what you were were entitled to receive.On 7/1/08, the California Lottery announced that they are using undercover agents to sting dishonest retailers, who cheat lottery winners out of their prizes. The press release on this matter pointed to a case in Morgan Hill, California where a dishonest retailer (and another individual) are being charged with grand theft of lottery tickets ranging in value from $500 to $25,000.I decided to see if I could find any additional...

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Data Theft Grows 68 Percent in 2008

Linda Foley at the Identity Theft Resource Center made an ominous announcement that data breaches were at an all time high. According to research conducted by the group, the number of data breaches has grown 68 percent in 2008 versus the same time period in 2007.The current study acknowledges that some breaches are under reported and multiple breaches are sometimes reported as a single event. The breach at BNY Mellon and SunGard data were cited as an example of a single event affecting multiple businesses.The report shows an increase in data breaches...

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