Actualités du cybercrime, de la criminalité informatique

An e-mail is sent to the victim’s inbox, supposedly from a hitman who has been hired by a « close friend » of the recipient to kill him/her, but will call off the hit in exchange for a large sum of money. This is usually backed up with a warning not to contact the local police or [...]

Another method is after winning a bid on items on the online auction site eBay (especially laptops or other consumer electronics), to suggest to use an escrow service. The escrow service is fraudulent and part of the scam. The victim will send the laptop or camera to the escrow service, never to hear from the [...]

In another updated scam, the scammer offers to buy some expensive item (e.g., jewelry or a car, that the prospective victim advertised on eBay, for example, or a legitimate classified-ads website such as craigslist) by official, certified, bank or cashier’s check. The check will have an « accidentally » or mutually agreed higher value than the price [...]

A recent variant is the « Romance Scam » which is a money-for-romance angle. The victim is usually approached on an online dating service and becomes interested in someone who has pictures posted of an attractive person who is not actually the poster. The offending party may claim to be interested in meeting the victim, but needs [...]

In another variation of the scam, the scammer places calls through IP Relay, a US federally funded internet telerelay service for deaf/hard of hearing/speech-disabled individuals. The scammer calls various businesses, attempting to purchase items with stolen or fraudulent credit cards. Often, individuals are targeted as well, most of whom have advertised a product or service [...]