The US Federal Trade Commission managed to stop the activities of Internet scammers who, with the help of 100 shell companies, stole money from Americans' credit cards and then transferred them to foreign accounts.
The US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) announced that it has stopped a long-running Internet scam in which criminals abroad stole money from American bank card users. This scheme was successfully used for about four years. The FTC says it demonstrates well how online services used by 21st century businesses can be used for fraud .
To date, American authorities have not yet identified those behind the implementation of this fraudulent scheme, but the ongoing investigation allowed them to file a civil lawsuit in US District Court in March of this year and freeze all the assets of the criminals , as well as arrest 14 so-called “money mules” - US citizens who were used by criminals to withdraw stolen funds abroad - usually to accounts in Bulgaria , Estonia and Cyprus.
“This was a very patient scam and the people behind it were very consistent. We will continue to aggressively investigate to find those at the helm of this scam,” said Steve Wernikoff, FTC staff attorney.
According to him, fraudsters found loopholes in the credit card processing system, registered a lot of fake companies in the United States and then made more than a million fake credit card transactions on their behalf through legitimate payment processing services, PCWeek reports.
Steve Vernikoff noted that US authorities have not yet established where the attackers obtained the credit card numbers they used, but it is likely that the numbers were purchased on closed carder forums (scammers who steal credit card numbers) and other resources of this kind.
The attackers managed to avoid coming to the attention of the authorities for a long time due to the fact that they withdrew very small amounts from the cards - from $0.25 to $9 per card. More than 100 fake companies were registered for these purposes.
Due to the small amount of stolen amounts, the majority of victims of fraud - 94% - did not even notice the loss of extra money from their account. According to the FTC, fraudsters managed to withdraw $9.5 million from 1.35 million credit cards, and only in 78,724 cases did cardholders notice the funds were missing.
To transfer stolen money abroad, scammers had to hire “money mules.” US citizens willing to withdraw funds for the criminals were recruited via the Internet, usually using spam emails. The victims thought they were helping an offshore business by transferring money to overseas accounts.
(c) https://www.cnews.ru/news/top/zablokirovana_krupnaya_onlajnbanda
The US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) announced that it has stopped a long-running Internet scam in which criminals abroad stole money from American bank card users. This scheme was successfully used for about four years. The FTC says it demonstrates well how online services used by 21st century businesses can be used for fraud .
To date, American authorities have not yet identified those behind the implementation of this fraudulent scheme, but the ongoing investigation allowed them to file a civil lawsuit in US District Court in March of this year and freeze all the assets of the criminals , as well as arrest 14 so-called “money mules” - US citizens who were used by criminals to withdraw stolen funds abroad - usually to accounts in Bulgaria , Estonia and Cyprus.
“This was a very patient scam and the people behind it were very consistent. We will continue to aggressively investigate to find those at the helm of this scam,” said Steve Wernikoff, FTC staff attorney.
According to him, fraudsters found loopholes in the credit card processing system, registered a lot of fake companies in the United States and then made more than a million fake credit card transactions on their behalf through legitimate payment processing services, PCWeek reports.
Steve Vernikoff noted that US authorities have not yet established where the attackers obtained the credit card numbers they used, but it is likely that the numbers were purchased on closed carder forums (scammers who steal credit card numbers) and other resources of this kind.
The attackers managed to avoid coming to the attention of the authorities for a long time due to the fact that they withdrew very small amounts from the cards - from $0.25 to $9 per card. More than 100 fake companies were registered for these purposes.
Due to the small amount of stolen amounts, the majority of victims of fraud - 94% - did not even notice the loss of extra money from their account. According to the FTC, fraudsters managed to withdraw $9.5 million from 1.35 million credit cards, and only in 78,724 cases did cardholders notice the funds were missing.
To transfer stolen money abroad, scammers had to hire “money mules.” US citizens willing to withdraw funds for the criminals were recruited via the Internet, usually using spam emails. The victims thought they were helping an offshore business by transferring money to overseas accounts.
(c) https://www.cnews.ru/news/top/zablokirovana_krupnaya_onlajnbanda
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