March 19, 2010
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Know Your Scareware, Pt.2
Ethics take second to monetary rewards.Companies like Innovative Marketing prey on young adults to hire and do their dirty work because most are inexperienced and easily persuaded. A former employee of the company who would like to remain nameless, said that young people don't care a whole lot about ethics so most weren't concerned about the company's credit card theft. They received good salaries and it was of little concern to them that the income came from stolen money by way of stolen credit cards. But, just as there is no free lunch, the young employees lost their jobs when Innovative was shut down as a result of a U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC) lawsuit asking a U.S. Federal Court to disband the credit card thieves. It was a victory for the FTC in the fight against cybercriminals.
The victory is a small one relative to the highly profitable credit card scam. However, the FTC gained a wealth of information on the inner mechanics of one of the fastest growing crime organizations. Shutting down Innovative Marketing affected a huge organized crime empire in operation across the globe from Europe to the Middle East to the United States. McAfee Inc, the world's expert and provider of security software, spent months looking into Innovative's operations. They found that the identity theft and credit card fraud activities generated over $180 million during 2008 in fake software sales alone.
Although cybercriminals like those from Innovative Marketing develop viruses and fake antivirus software, the company typically does not use the stolen credit card numbers to fund its business. These companies earn income from the sale of the fake antivirus software and PC cleanup software. They also commission outside hackers to infect the computers and make them nearly impossible to run. Not only do these hackers paralyze the computer, but it removes legitimate antivirus software from other vendors which makes the machine vulnerable to attack. The hackers sell the stolen card information on the black market to the highest bidder.