INTERPOL-COORDINATED OPERATION STRIKES BACK AT SEXTORTION NETWORKS

An INTERPOL coordinated operation targeting organized crime networks behind ‘sextortion’ cases around the world has resulted in the arrest of 58 individuals, including three men linked to the group which harassed Scottish teenager Daniel Perry. Perry, a 17-year-old victim of an online blackmail attempt, died after jumping off the Forth Road Bridge near Edinburgh, Scotland, in July last year. In the first operation of its kind, information shared between the INTERPOL Digital Crime Centre (IDCC), Hong Kong Police Force, Singapore Police Force and the Philippines National Police (PNP) Anti-Cybercrime Group led to the identification of between 190 and 195 individuals working for organized crime groups operating out of the Philippines.

Close cooperation with Police Scotland, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Homeland Security Investigations (HSI), the Philippines Department of Justice Office of Cybercrime and the U.K.’s National Crime Agency CEOP Command, resulted in the identification of sextortion victims in Indonesia, the Philippines, Singapore, the United Kingdom and the United States. Potential victims were also traced to Australia, Korea and Malaysia in addition to the hundreds of individuals in Hong Kong and Singapore already reported as victims. Codenamed Operation Strikeback, a series of raids was carried out by the PNP in Bicol, Bulacan, Laguna and Taguig City April 30 and May 1 resulting in the seizure of 250 pieces of electronic evidence including mobile phones, laptops, network and storage devices, as well as live ammunition. Among those arrested were Vincent Regori Bravo, Jomar Palacio (alias Park Ji Man) and Archie (alias Gian) Tolin, suspected of targeting U.K. victims and who face charges including the Violation of Access Devices Regulation Act. Operating on an almost industrial scale from call centre-style offices, such cyber-blackmail agents are provided with training and offered bonus incentives such as holidays, cash or mobile phones for reaching their financial targets.

Sextortion is often defined as sexual blackmail in which sexual information or images are used to extort sexual favours and/or money from the victim, with blackmail demands ranging between USD 500 and USD 15,000. In addition to the Asia-based networks, there is also evidence of individuals and groups operating out of Africa targeting victims throughout Europe. “The scale of these sextortion networks is massive, and run with just one goal in mind: to make money regardless of the terrible emotional damage they inflict on their victims,” said Sanjay Virmani, Director of the IDCC. “The success of Operation Strikeback is down to the cooperation between the law enforcement agencies in the involved countries, particularly the Philippine National Police, and also demonstrates INTERPOL’s key role in coordinating and supporting transnational investigations,” said Noboru Nakatani, executive director of the INTERPOL Global Complex for Innovation (IGCI) in Singapore which houses the IDCC. “It is also a clear indicator that when the IGCI officially opens its doors later this year, this increased opportunity for information sharing will lead to further successes and help close the net on cybercriminals around the world.” concluded Mr Nakatani. Chief of Philippine National Police Alan la Madrid Purisima said they would continue to identify and arrest anyone involved in sextortion. “These arrests show our continued determination to bring these criminals to justice and our willingness to work with law enforcement around the world in order to do this.” said Chief Purisima. “This successful operation stemmed from an INTERPOL meeting and we look forward to our continued collaboration to show that there can be no hiding place.”

Police Scotland’s Assistant Chief Constable Malcolm Graham, Major Crime and Public Protection, said: “A young Scottish teenager lost his life as a result of this online activity. The impact on his family, friends and wider community cannot be imagined. “Our message is clear: Our focus is on keeping people safe and there is no hiding place anywhere in the world, if you are a criminal and you undertake this type of activity, which preys on those who might be the most vulnerable and susceptible to coercion and blackmail.” “Combating the sexual exploitation of children is a global effort,” said HSI Office of International Affairs Assistant Director John G. Connolly. “HSI works closely with the law enforcement community around the world on joint operations and provides training and expertise to many foreign countries. Our mission takes us across oceans to protect children wherever they may be and ensure that criminals are brought to justice.”

The U.K.’s Foreign and Commonwealth Office provided funding toward Operation Strikeback to support both operational coordination and a capacity building project to help tackle future cybercrime threats. U.K. Ambassador to the Philippines Asif Ahmad said: “Cybercrime comes in many shapes and forms. It recognizes no national boundaries and can affect every one of us. The international cooperation displayed by the different law enforcement agencies across the world in this investigation should send a message to those who commit cybercrime, there is nowhere to hide.” Material seized during Operation Strikeback will be analyzed by specialist officers from the involved countries in order to identify any additional victims and for follow-up investigations. One of the key aims of INTERPOL’s upcoming Turn Back Crime global awareness campaign is to educate society about the ways in which organized crime infiltrates our daily lives, and to assist the public in protecting themselves.

POLICE WARN MEN OVER ONLINE 'SEXTORTION'

West Midlands police say eight men have come forward saying they were lured into video chats and then blackmailed. Police have warned men to be wary of online "sextortionists" who blackmail victims by threatening to post explicit footage of them on the internet. Eight victims have contacted West Midlands police in recent months after being instructed to pay thousands of pounds into offshore bank accounts. Officers say the blackmailers lured men into online video sex chats and then sent screen grabs to them along with demands for cash. One man faced a demand for $5,000 (£3,000) from offenders who threatened to email images to his girlfriend and his daughter. The offenders usually target their victims on social media sites such as Facebook and through conversations on Skype or FaceTime.

Detective constable Stefan Ashton, of West Midlands police, said: "Since January we have seen a rise in the number of these offences in the West Midlands, with victims in Wolverhampton, Birmingham, Dudley, Walsall and Coventry.” In most of the cases, the videos have not actually been distributed, but it is nevertheless been an absolutely horrendous ordeal for the people involved, who are understandably very worried about the consequences of such images and videos being posted online. "The damage in the cases where the footage was shared with the victims' Facebook friends cannot be underestimated; they are clearly devastated. The blackmailers are calculated and malicious and have complete disregard for the people they're exploiting." He added: "Cases of this type are notoriously complex, and because IP addresses are usually traced back to foreign countries, they often, despite our best efforts, go unsolved." We are working closely with partners such as the National Crime Agency to crack down on offenders but the only real way to prevent this from happening is by not taking part in such activity at all. The moment you reveal yourself in an online video, you become vulnerable to exploitation and sadly it is the blackmailers who instantly become in control of the situation."

“BEWARE OF FAKE FACEBOOK ACCOUNTS OF MEN OF GOD”

The users of social media should be vigilant of fake Facebook accounts open in the name of men of God by con artists to scam innocent victims. Con artists use names and pictures of men of God as well as celebrities and eminent personalities across the globe to set up online account in order to swindle innocent victims in the process of time. The account seems to be real; but in the process of time, the motive behind the opening of the account will be unleashed. They post daily appealing prayer points, offer all form of advices to followers. They look so real; but they are con artists. They have good strategies in kit and they do apply it in stages until they capture the mind of potential victims. 

I would have be a victim of the same scam. A suspected con artist opens a Facebook account in the name of Foluke Adeboye; wife of Pastor Enoch Adeboye, the overseer of RCCG and sends friend request to potential victims. I accepted the friend request some weeks back. She used to post prayer on her page and also to my inbox which l do respond to; until she came up with a project RCCG is proposing to undertake. She encouraged me to be part of the project and also to give towards it. I pretended to fall for her deceit in order to get more information from her. She sent an account details to me. Below are our conversations:

     Beware of this Facebook account, it is a scam!!!!!!!!. She uploaded a picture from my own account which she may use in future to scam other victims.

HOMELAND SECURITY’S REPORT ON SEXTORTION.

Homeland Security Investigations is looking into a possible Myrtle Beach area case of “sextortion”, a fairly new and growing crime that targets teenagers through their use of social media websites such as Facebook and Instagram. As social networking grows, experts say, so does the opportunity for predators to contact children, gain their trust and then blackmail them into engaging in sex or sending lewd photos of themselves over the Internet. The Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force, a Justice Department program that helps state and local law enforcement battle sexual exploitation of children, said such cases totaled 7,000 nationwide in 2013, up from 5,300 cases just three years earlier.

“Predators used to stalk the playground. This is the new playground,” Brock Nicholson, an HSI special agent based in Atlanta told USA Today this month. “I would argue that this is an epidemic and people have no idea.” Information from an affidavit for a search warrant in the Myrtle Beach area case mirrors dozens of sextortion tales on the FBI’s website and in court documents nationwide. According to the affidavit and related court documents, a Homeland Security Investigations special agent executed a search warrant earlier this month at a home on Pinto Lane in unincorporated Horry County, where the agent seized a laptop computer, a Nook tablet, a PlayStation Portable and documents believed to be associated with the sextortion of a 14-year-old girl from Michigan.

Investigators believe 22-year-old man who is staying at that address, may have played a role in the sextortion, according to the affidavit. No charges have been filed against the man, who did not respond to a request for comments. The Sun News does not use the names of suspects who have not been charged. Homeland Security and Michigan officials traced an IP address used to access social networks where photos of the girl had been uploaded to an account registered to the suspect, according to the affidavit. Other IP addresses used to access the social networks were traced to Ripley’s Aquarium and Ben & Jerry’s ice cream shop, both located at Broadway at the Beach. The suspect, a 2014 Coastal Carolina University graduate, worked at Ben & Jerry’s and the Margaritaville restaurant at Broadway at the Beach, adjacent to the aquarium, during the times photos were posted to the social media sites, the affidavit states.

According to the affidavit, the Tuscola County, Mich., Sheriff’s Office met with the 14-year-old girl’s parents in February after learning of nude images of the girl stored on her iPod. The girl told police that she had been contacted by a stranger via the Instagram picture and message sharing service. While communicating with the stranger through Instagram and Kik Messenger, the girl sent the stranger a picture of herself wearing a bathing suit as well as a picture of herself wearing underwear.

The stranger, who claimed to be an 18-year-old male from Georgia, then requested nude photos of the girl and threatened to post the pictures she had already sent online if she did not comply. The girl eventually sent the nude photos and the stranger continued to pressure her into sending more explicit pictures, again threatening to post those she had already sent if she did not respond. The girl told police that the photographs the stranger requested “ranged from photographs of the [girl] nude to photographs for which the [stranger] specifically directed the [girl] into sexual poses and activities,” according to the affidavit. The alleged sextortion continued while the girl was on vacation with her parents, according to the affidavit. The parents recalled their daughter spending hours at a time in the bathroom while on the vacation and the girl later confirmed that she was communicating with the stranger and sending photos during that time.

The girl made numerous attempts to break contact with the stranger, at which point he would threaten to post her photos online. At one point when the girl stopped sending photos, the stranger contacted one of her Instagram friends “demanding the [girl] contact the suspect,” the affidavit states.

It is not clear how long the alleged sextortion took place, but Michigan officials contacted Homeland Security Investigations for assistance within weeks of meeting with the girl’s parents. The crimes alleged in the affidavit include coercing a minor to engage in sexual activity, which includes a mandatory minimum prison sentence of 10 years, and receiving or distributing child pornography, which carries a prison sentence of at least five years. Sextortion is a growing crime, in part, because of the boom in social media use age among teenagers and others in recent years.

“We are talking about kids with a lot of privacy and a lot of technology,” Michelle Collins, vice president of the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, told NBC News last year. “And they’re at a sexually curious age.” Experts say the best advice for parents is to be aware of who their children are talking to online and through social media sites, teach children to be wary of strangers who contact them and to contact law enforcement if anyone tries to solicit their child.

‘SEXTORTION’ BLACKMAIL ATTACKS ON THE RISE, POLICE WARN

‘Sextortion’ attacks, where cybercriminals blackmail victims with the threat of exposing explicit photographs or messages are becoming increasingly common, according to a report by Bloomberg News. The FBI has issued warnings that sextortion is on the rise; with attackers using methods including searching stolen computer equipment for explicit imagery, hacking social media accounts and using malware to steal images from computers. Bloomberg describes one case in which a young mother (name withheld) was driven to suicide, and interviewed a New Hampshire woman whose suffering at the hands of a “sextortionist” left her feeling traumatized two years later.

Previous reports have highlighted cases in which children were targeted and blackmailed into uploading further naked pictures, which were then traded among paedophiles online. “This is a growing problem,” said Wesley Hsu, chief of the cyber-crimes unit at the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Los Angeles. Hsu says that the threat of exposure in sextortion attacks is particularly distressing as the internet is “quite permanent”. Bloomberg reports that at least 20 criminals have been prosecuted for such scams, with victims thought to number in the thousands. The FBI has previously warned of a growing number of criminals involved in “sextortion”.

HOMELAND SECURITY RAIDS PINTO LANE HOME.

Homeland Security Investigations executed a search warrant at the Pinto Lane home in July after investigating allegations that a man living there had pressured a 14-year-old girl from Michigan into sending him nude images of herself.

The charge involving a prepubescent minor stems from items seized during the search. Investigators also seized a laptop computer, a Nook tablet, a PlayStation Portable and unspecified documents. According to an affidavit included with the search warrant documents, the Tuscola County, Mich., Sheriff’s Office met with the 14-year-old girl’s parents in February after learning of nude images of the girl stored on her iPod.

The girl told police that she had been contacted by a stranger via the Instagram picture and message sharing service. While communicating with the stranger through Instagram and Kik Messenger, the girl sent the stranger a picture of herself wearing a bathing suit as well as a picture of herself, wearing underwear.

The stranger, who claimed to be an 18-year-old male from Georgia, then requested nude photos of the girl and threatened to post the pictures she had already sent online if she did not comply. The girl eventually sent the nude photos and the stranger continued to pressure her into sending more explicit pictures, again threatening to post those she had already sent if she did not respond.

The girl told police that the photographs the stranger requested “ranged from photographs of the [girl] nude to photographs for which the [stranger] specifically directed the [girl] into sexual poses and activities,” according to the affidavit.

The alleged sextortion continued while the girl was on vacation with her parents, according to the affidavit. The parents recalled their daughter spending hours at a time in the bathroom while on the vacation and the girl later confirmed that she was communicating with the stranger and sending photos during that time.
The girl made numerous attempts to break contact with the stranger, at which point he would threaten to post her photos online. At one point when the girl stopped sending photos, the stranger contacted one of her Instagram friends “demanding the [girl] contact the suspect,” the affidavit states. Investigators were able to trace the IP addresses used to contact the girl and receive the photos to the Pinto Lane home, according to court documents. The affidavit in support of a search warrant named several individuals, although it is not clear whether more charges are pending. Reynolds states on his Facebook page that he is a 2010 graduate of Socastee High School and a 2014 graduate of Coastal Carolina University. Sextortion is a growing Internet crime in which predators contact children through Facebook and other social media sites, gain their trust and then blackmail them into engaging in sex or sending lewd photos over the Internet. The Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force, a Justice Department program that helps state and local law enforcement battle sexual exploitation of children, said such cases totaled 7,000 nationwide in 2013; up from 5,300 cases just three years earlier. However, the charges carry a combined maximum sentence of 60 years in prison. An arraignment hearing for Reynolds is scheduled for 10:30 a.m. on Aug. 28 in Florence.

UAE YOUTH IN 'HONEY TRAPS' VIA DATING SITES

By Staff/Wam

Abu Dhabi Police have issued a warning about electronic blackmail traps from dating sites that are targeting young people in the UAE. According to the statement from the Ministry of Interior, international gangs are behind the traps and once a person falls for the scam, video clips enable the criminals to blackmail the victims. According to Colonel Dr Rashid Mohammad Bu Rasheed, Director, Department of Criminal Investigation, Organised Crime, 33 complaints of blackmail have been received in the first six months of this year. Most involved videos of the victims in inappropriate situations. He said that the gang, from outside the UAE, specifically targeted young people with the threat of publishing their private videos on social networking sites. Colonel Dr Rashid Mohammad Bu Rasheed said the police continue to search for such criminals and keep track of their activity in coordination with the competent authorities, as well as blocking sites involved. He adds that the gang is careful not to talk online evading any voice recording system. Once they have convinced the victim to send a compromising video, the gang begins extorting the victim. The Abu Dhabi Police has warned the public about falling victim to fraud and extortion online and urged them not to disclose personal information online.

The Abu Dhabi Police have exposed an international gang that uses clips and scenes from archived sexual videos and a female voice-over to lure male victims in front of webcams and record them while they participate in indecent behaviour. The victim is filmed without their knowledge and the gang then extorts money from them in exchange for not publishing those webcam shots on the internet. Colonel Dr Rashid Mohammed Borshid, Head of the Criminal Investigation Department (CID), has warned the public against falling prey to cyber fraud and extortion. As part of an awareness drive launched by the Abu Dhabi Police to combat cybercrimes, Colonel Dr Borshid pointed out that the said gang worked on threatening some users of social networking sites by using revealing compromising recordings of the victims. According to Colonel Dr Borshid, the Abu Dhabi Police received a number of complaints from victims targeted by this gang.

          “The gang specifically targets young people, particularly males. It communicates with them via electronic applications on computers using some social media sites, including Skype. “They use aliases for the girls who lure them through dubbed voices to film the male victims in sexually revealing positions. The gang then uses those recorded videos to blackmail and threaten the victims, in exchange for sums of money transferred to accounts outside the country,” explained Colonel Dr Borshid. Lieutenant Colonel Taher Al Dhaheri, Head of Organised Crime at the Criminal Investigation Department (CID), revealed that the gang's victims are not only males. A forty-year old Arab woman complained about being drawn into sexual scenes with a gangster, who alleged to be an influential well-known community figure. He told her he would employ her in a private company. She discovered later on that he is a member of an extortion ring who hacked into her electronic account.

Lieutenant Colonel Taher Al Dhaheri, Head of the Organised Crime, revealed that the gang had drained the savings of some victims. One of the victims, a Gulf national, sent frequent money transfers outside the UAE, totalling to Dh10,000, to withdraw a video clip showing him in scenes of a sexual nature, before contacting the Abu Dhabi Police. Lieutenant Colonel Taher Al Dhaheri, Head of the Organised Crime indicated that an Arab architect filed a complaint in which he said that he had been lured by the gang into sexual scenes. “The architect also pointed out that he is married and has several children, the eldest aged 18. Colonel Dr Borshid called on the public not to trust strangers or emails sent from suspicious sites, which lure them into fake intimate, romantic relationships. He also indicated that users of social networking sites reveal too many personal details while chatting with strangers, which makes them easy targets for hackers who steal their files and download their pictures and videos to blackmail and extort money. “The cybercrimes rate in Abu Dhabi is still limited compared to many cities around the world. “Nevertheless, it is a scourge that must be curtailed through concerted efforts with community members. “It is vitally important to notify the police when any individual falls prey to cybercrime in order to ensure the proper search and investigation operations can be carried out. This would lead to the quick identification and arrest of offenders,” Colonel Dr Borshid says. He added that specialised police teams at the cybercrime branch of the CID receive notifications and browse websites to identify and locate suspects. The Abu Dhabi Police has a forensic laboratory to examine electronic evidence. The Abu Dhabi Police is coordinating and passing the information to security authorities in countries that have such kinds of gangs operating.

IS THIS A SCAM?

Andrew Sayer

An Australian man, Andrew Sayer who claimed he sent $10,000 to a friend in Port-Harcourt, Nigeria has come on twitter to say, his friend has stopped replying his mails since he received the money in Nigeria.  Sayer says he fears his friend must have been down with Ebola and that iss why he has not been replying him. He asked Nigerians if they know who his friend is, Oghenekohwo and how he can contact him. These were his comments on twitter:

Is this another scam or what? 

REPORT FROM CID PART II

From the findings of CID, following information was made to all the users of internet dating sites. DO NOT EVER SEND MONEY! Be extremely suspicious if you are asked for money for transportation costs, communication fees or marriage processing and medical fees. Carefully check out the stories you are being told. If it sounds suspicious; there is a reason, it is routinely false, trust your instincts. If you do start an internet-based relationship with someone, check them out, research what they are telling you with someone who would know, such as a current or former service member.

   Be very suspicious if you never get to actually speak with the person on the phone or you are told you cannot write or receive letters in the mail. Servicemen and women serving overseas will often have an APO or FPO mailing address. Internet or not, service members always appreciate a letter in the mail. Military members have an email address that end in “.mil.” If the person you are speaking with cannot sent you at least one email from a “.mil” (that will be the very LAST part of the address and nothing after), then there is a high probability they are not in the military.

   Many of the negative claims made about the military and the supposed lack of support and services provided to troops overseas are far from reality, check the facts. Be very suspicious if you are asked to send money or ship property to a third party or company. Often times the company exists, but has no idea or is not a part of the scam. Be aware of common spelling, grammatical or language errors in the emails. Be cognizant of foreign and regional accents that do not match the person’s story.

WHERE TO GO FOR HELP

Report the theft to the Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3) (FBI-NW3C Partnership) at http://www.ic3.gov/default.aspx. Report the theft to the Federal Trade Commission at http://www.ftc.gov/idtheft.

Your report helps law enforcement officials across the United States in their investigations. Report the theft by phone at 1-877-ID-THEFT (438-4338) or TTY, 1-866-653-4261.

Report the theft by mail at the following address: Identity Theft Clearinghouse Federal Trade Commission Washington, DC 20580

Report the fraud by email to the Federal Trade Commission on Nigerian Scams via at spam@uce.gov.

For more information on CID, visit http://www.cid.army.mil.

REPORT FROM CID

 Special Agents from the U.S. Army Criminal Investigation Command, commonly known as CID, are once again warning internet users worldwide about cyber criminals involved in an on-line crime that CID has dubbed “the Romance Scam.” CID special agents continue to receive numerous reports from victims located around the world regarding various scams of persons impersonating U.S. Soldiers online. Victims are usually unsuspecting women, 30 to 55 years old, who believe they are romantically involved with an American Soldier, yet are being exploited and ultimately robbed, by perpetrators who strike from thousands of miles away.

 “We cannot stress enough that people need to stop sending money to persons they meet on the internet and claim to be in the U.S. military,” said Chris Grey, Army CID’s spokesman. “It is very troubling to hear these stories over and over again of people who have sent thousands of dollars to someone they have never met and sometimes have never even spoken to on the phone,” Grey said. The majority of the “romance scams,” are being perpetrated on social media and dating-type websites where unsuspecting females are the main target. The criminals are pretending to be U.S. servicemen, routinely serving in a combat zone. The perpetrators will often take the true rank and name of a U.S. Soldier who is honourably serving his country somewhere in the world, or has previously served and been honourably discharged, then marry that up with some photographs of a Soldier off the internet, and then build a false identity to begin prowling the internet for victims.

 The scams often involve carefully worded romantic requests for money from the victim to purchase special laptop computers, international telephones, military leave papers, and transportation fees to be used by the fictitious “deployed Soldier” so their false relationship can continue. The scams include asking the victim to send money, often thousands of dollars at a time, to a third party address. Once victims are hooked, the criminals continue their ruse. “We have even seen instances where the perpetrators are asking the victims for money to purchase “leave papers” from the Army, help pay for medical expenses from combat wounds or help pay for their flight home so they can leave the war zone,” said Grey.

 These scams are outright theft and are a grave misrepresentation of the U.S. Army and the tremendous amount of support programs and mechanisms that exist for Soldiers today, especially those serving overseas, said Grey. Along with the romance-type scams, CID has been receiving complaints from citizens worldwide that they have been the victims of other types of scams; once, again where a cyber-crook is impersonating a U.S. service member. One version usually involves the sale of a vehicle; where the service member claims to be living overseas and has to quickly sell their vehicle because they are being sent to another duty station. After sending bogus information regarding the vehicle, the seller requests the buyer do a wire transfer to a third party to complete the purchase. When in reality, the entire exchange is a ruse for the crook to get the wire transfer and leave the buyer high and dry, with no vehicle.

 Army CID continues to warn people to be very suspicious if they begin a relationship on the internet with someone claiming to be an American Soldier and within a matter of weeks, the alleged Soldier is asking for money, as well as discussing marriage. The majority of these scams have a distinct pattern to them, explained Grey. The perpetrators often tell the victims that their units do not have telephones or they are not allowed to make calls or they need money to “help keep the Army internet running.” They often say they are widowers and raising a young child on their own to pull on the heartstrings of their victims. “We have even seen where the criminals said that the Army will not allow the Soldier to access their personal bank accounts or credit cards,” said Grey. All lies, according to CID officials. “These perpetrators, often from other countries, most notably from West African countries, are good at what they do and quite familiar with American culture, but the claims about the Army and its regulations are ridiculous,” said Grey. The Army reports that numerous very senior officers and enlisted Soldiers throughout the Army have had their identities stolen to be used in these scams.

 To date, there have been no reports to Army CID indicating any U.S. service members have suffered any financial loss as a result of these attacks. Photographs and actual names of U.S. service members have been the only thing utilized. On the contrary, the victims have lost thousands. One victim revealed that she had sent more than $60,000 to the scammer. Another victim from Great Britain told CID officials that over the course of a year, she had sent more than $75,000 to the con artists. “The criminals are preying on the emotions and patriotism of their victims,” added Grey. The U.S. has established numerous task force organizations to deal with this and other growing issues; unfortunately, the people committing these scams are using untraceable email addresses on G-mail, Yahoo, Hotmail, etc., routing accounts through numerous locations around the world, and utilizing pay-per-hour Internet cybercafés, which often times maintain no accountability of use. The ability of law enforcement to identify these perpetrators is very limited, so individuals must stay on the alert and be personally responsible to protect themselves.

 “Another critical issue is we do not want victims who do not report this crime walking away and thinking that a U.S. serviceman has ripped them off when in fact that serviceman is honorably serving his country and often not even aware that his pictures or identity have been stolen,” said Grey.

    To be continued………..

MAN ARRESTED AFTER GOOGLE INFORMED POLICE OF CHILD PORN IN GMAIL BOX

 

Houston resident, John Henry Skillern was arrested recently for trading child pornography over his Google Gmail e-mail account. If that is where the story began and ended this news article would be a pretty open and shut affair for most readers.  What changes the dynamic is how he was found out.  His arrested was not prompted as a part of a clandestine operation where authorities posed as the buyer or solicitor, it was not a tip from a victim or a remorseful member of this illegal underground, nor was it the happenstance of a lucky find by physical detectives looking into some other infraction.

John Henry Skillern, 41, was charged with possession of child pornography and promotion of child pornography. Instead Skillern was found to have been engaged in this activity by his email host company, Google. Yes, Skillern was using Gmail to do this, and while sweeping through his personal information for Google’s various algorithms Google found the images being trafficked across their service. This got automatically flagged as an inappropriate use of Gmail using several filters and sent to Google for them to decide what to do with this information. They decided to go to the police, which promptly arrested Skillner for the alleged deed. Police say Google detected explicit images of a young girl in an email that John Henry Skillern was sending to a friend, the company then alerted the authorities. “He was trying to get around getting caught, he was trying to keep it inside his email,” said Detective David Nettles of the Houston Metro Internet Crimes Against Children Taskforce. “I cannot see that information, I cannot see that photo, but Google can.”

Skillern is a registered sex offender who was convicted of sexually assaulting an 8 year old boy in 1994. During the search of his electronic devices, police say they found that Skillern had video on his cell phone of the young children that visited the Denny’s restaurant where he worked. A neighbour, Yesenia Gonzales, seemed  just fine with the email scanning that lead to Skillern’s arrest when she told KHOU, “Thank goodness for Google.” While stopping a child predator is never a bad thing, the fact that Google can just take a stroll through your personal info and do what they like does not sit well with many. From most legal perspectives, Google is not in the wrong technically because your fourth amendment rights do not carry over to third parties that are not the US government which is the entire problem. Almost all of your data online goes through a third party multiple times, which essentially makes the World Wide Web a fourth amendment free zone.  You are never safe from the government watching what you do through the corporate proxies that run the show, which is clearly not what the authors of the amendment intended in the slightest.

So where can the line be drawn for users to have the privacy guaranteed to them if they decide to use more archaic technologies like snail mail or hard line telephones, yet still allow investigators to find bad guys online? That is the real sticky widget and it’s one of the most important battles raging right now between advocacy groups and policy makers across the board. There is likely not to be one completely correct answer, but hopefully society can find that compromise that will save us from big brother, but will allow the World Wide Web to be a safe place from predators as well.

NAKED IMAGES ARE HACKERS’ NEW PLOY

Clarification is needed on the law around "revenge porn" and when it could lead to a prosecution, a committee of peers has said. The practice involves people posting sexually explicit pictures and videos of former partners on websites and social networks after they split up. Last week the Justice Minister, Lord Faulks, admitted that revenge pornography was a growing problem and said the government was urgently considering new laws to tackle it. Now the House of Lords Communications Committee, in a review of the laws on social media crime, has called on the director of public prosecutions to clarify when the practice becomes a criminal offence.

In the report they said: "We would welcome clarification from the DPP as to the circumstances in which an indecent communication could and should be subject to prosecution under Section 127 of the Communications Act 2003 or Section 1 of the Malicious Communications Act 1988." The peers said that current laws, most of which pre-dated social media such as Facebook, Twitter and YouTube, were "generally appropriate" and prosecutions could be brought under the Communications Act 2003, Malicious Communications Act 1988 and the 1997 Protection from Harassment Act. The report also outlines some measures to better protect victims, pointing to schools, parents and the social media sites themselves.

     The committee, chaired by Lord Richard Best, said: "We encourage website operators further to develop their ability to monitor the use made of their services. In particular, it would be desirable for website operators to explore developing systems capable of preventing harassment, for example by the more effective real-time monitoring of traffic.

"Our inquiry is limited to consideration of the law. It strikes us though that parents and schools have a responsibility generally to educate children. Children need to be taught that being horrid online is just as wrong and hurtful as being horrid face to face." Lord Faulks has called the practice "cowardly and despicable" and peers called for a clause to be inserted into the Criminal Justice and Courts bill. 'Revenge porn' laws must be clearer, say Lords

WOMAN SUES FACEBOOK FOR EX’S ‘REVENGE PORN’ POSTINGS

A Houston woman is suing social media giant Facebook after a compromising picture of her was posted by her ex-boyfriend on his Facebook page, opening a new legal front in the battle to aid victims of “revenge porn.” In her suit filed last month, Meryem Ali alleges that “ex-friend” Adeel Shah Khan started an “imposter Facebook site” that featured Photoshopped photos of Ms. Ali’s head attached to “false, phony, naked body shots,” and one photo where she is “in a graphic, pornographic, like photo purporting to be in the middle of a sexual act.” Ms. Ali is seeking “full justice” against Facebook and Mr. Khan for the “significant trauma, extreme humiliation, extreme embarrassment, severe emotional disturbances and severe mental and physical suffering.” She is suing for $123 million or 10 cents for every one of Facebook’s 1.23 billion users.

Facebook has declined to comment on the lawsuit, but the case has focused renewed attention on the efforts to combat so-called “revenge porn” and on the struggles the legal system has faced in obtaining justice for victims of sexual abuse and exploitation in the age of the Internet. Revenge porn, also known as “cyber rape,” is the distribution of nude or sexually explicit content without the consent of the individual pictured. Typically, a couple will share sexually suggestive pictures or videos as a consensual act, but when the relationship ends, an angered ex will post the material online out of spite. The content is usually attached with personal information about the individual: phone number, links to social media profiles, address and employment. Several websites even sprang up to collect and disseminate revenge porn.

Britain, Japan and dozens of U.S. state legislatures are now looking at laws and legal arguments to halt revenge porn, and the Houston lawsuit is believed to be the first to go after the social media sites that can host revenge porn postings. According to the petition filed July 25, Ms. Ali was not aware of the photos until family and friends were invited to connect to the phony site in December 2013. Following months of requests to connect to the fake Ms. Ali’s Facebook page, the bogus page was removed after the Houston Police Department subpoenaed Facebook’s records. Ms. Ali alleges Facebook “failed to live up to its worldwide marketing and advertising promise” to take down fake sites in a timely fashion.

INTERNET SEXTORTION

     

            The email terrified the young mother. "What if I told you I had pictures of you?" the anonymous writer asked. "Like a lot. Would you send me more?" "They were pretty X-rated," he added. To prove he was not bluffing, the mysterious e-mailer sent four naked or suggestive photographs of the woman, which had been stored in a laptop computer stolen in a recent burglary of her New Hampshire apartment. He threatened to publish them if she did not send him more explicit ones. And if she had any doubt that he was a cruel, "sick" person, "then l am going to act like one," he wrote.

The harassing emails were emblematic of what U.S. law enforcement officials say is a growing and particularly invasive form of cyberstalking that is getting their increasing attention. It has been given a chilling moniker: "sextortion." "This is a growing problem," said Wesley Hsu, the chief of the cyber and intellectual property crimes unit at the U.S. attorney's office in Los Angeles, which has handled several such prosecutions. The victims "suffer understandable emotional distress at the moment it happens, and the Internet is unfortunately quite permanent and it can have an effect on these mostly young women for a long time." "They can perceive it as their life being over," he said. The crime exacted a lasting psychological toll on the New Hampshire mother, despite a quick arrest. She was devastated by the threat to post her naked photos on the Internet and to mail them to others in her hometown. Almost two years after the stalking ended, prosecutors wrote, she remained "thoroughly traumatized."

On July 10, the 24-year-old woman died in what police in Dover, N.H., called an apparent suicide by hanging. She left behind a 4-year-old son. Bloomberg News is withholding the victim's identity out of respect for the son's privacy and because she was not named in court papers. In an interview several weeks before the suicide, Justice Department prosecutor Mona Sedky said that for the woman, "it was really no different than someone being present with a weapon and trying to make her take her clothes off." Sextortionists ply their trade not only by stealing equipment but also by hacking into computers, social media accounts and emails, and even hijacking webcams. After obtaining the photographs, they use them to demand ransom in the form of cash or more explicit pictures and videos.

Since 2008, federal prosecutors have charged at least 20 men with this form of extortion in crimes involving hundreds, if not thousands, of victims, according to court papers. They say the crime is vastly underreported. "Victims of sextortion have disincentives to reporting," said Hsu, the Los Angeles-based prosecutor. "Many are threatened with worse consequences if they go to law enforcement, and they feel deeply embarrassed and ashamed."

The offenders range from teenagers to members of church choirs and teachers. In one case, a Danish man posed as a young boy to obtain photos of an 11-year-old girl in Missouri. The victims are usually young women and youths, but men have also been targeted. In 2010, a professional poker player's naked photos were emailed to 100 people after he refused to comply with a hacker's demand for $100,000. Because of the Internet, sextortionists can rack up large numbers of victims. A 28-year-old California man, Karen "Gary" Kazaryan, broke into more than 350 social media, email and Skype accounts to obtain naked photographs. Federal agents discovered at least 1,100 photos of naked or semi-naked women on his computer. If the victims did not comply by sending him more photos or videos, he carried out his threat to post them online, "causing horrified victims to receive calls from other friends about how their entire friend network could now see them naked," prosecutors wrote. Kazaryan was sentenced in December to five years in federal prison.

Richard Finkbiner tricked boys and girls into engaging in sexual activity in front of a web camera while he secretly recorded the sessions. Afterward, the 42-year-old Indiana man threatened to publish the videos on pornographic websites unless the victims became his "cam slaves" by engaging in more such activity, according to prosecutors. When a 17-year-old Cincinnati girl told Finkbiner she had tried to kill herself the previous night after he had successfully coerced her into engaging in sexual acts on video, Finkbiner showed no compassion. "Glad l could help," he wrote. Finkbiner, who was sentenced to 40 years in prison in 2012, ended up collecting tens of thousands of images depicting the sexual abuse of his victims, prosecutors said.

Other hackers have used software that infected computers with viruses to obtain compromising photos and videos. A victim of such a hack was Cassidy Wolf, who was Miss Teen California last year when she received an email containing two photographs of her naked in her own bedroom. They had been taken by her laptop's webcam, which had been surreptitiously commandeered by a hacker and used to spy on her. The email threatened to make the photos and others public if she did not reply with higher-quality photos and videos, or "do what I tell you to do for 5 minutes" during an online video chat. "Your dream of being a model will be transformed into a porn star," the email promised. When Wolf did not comply, the e-mailer posted the photos on social media sites. He also replaced her Twitter avatar with a half-nude photograph. "I do not even know how to describe how I felt at the time," the 20-year-old Wolf, who won the most recent Miss Teen USA contest, said in a telephone interview. "I felt violated. It was a modern version of a peeping tom." It took authorities six months to arrest and charge the extortionist: Jared James Abrahams, 20, a former high school classmate of Wolf's. Abrahams was sentenced in March to 18 months in federal prison for hacking into as many as 150 online accounts and extorting teenage girls and young women into sending him nude photos and videos. At least two complied with the demands. Like Wolf, the New Hampshire mother would learn that she knew her anonymous stalker. The suspect was John B. Villegas, a Navy sailor, who was the husband of her son's babysitter.

He was arrested by the Secret Service within a week of sending the first email in July 2012. In March, he was sentenced to 33 months in federal prison after having pleaded guilty to one count of cyberstalking. He also pleaded guilty in state court to stealing the woman's laptop. Calling Villegas "a sexual cyber predator," federal prosecutors wrote in court papers that the Maine resident was "strikingly callous" -- stepping up his threats even after the mother pleaded that posting the photos would wreck her reputation and endanger her toddler's safety. "The emotional distress he caused" the mother, prosecutors wrote, "will be everlasting."

Posted by Del Quentin Wilber Bloomerg news