Phishing Scammer May Be Facing A Century In Prison
from the gone-phishin' dept
If you thought nine years in jail for spamming was excessive, then how about 101 years for phishing? That's what one phisher is facing after being convicted on various counts for his phishing scam that netted lots of credit card info from gullible AOL users. It's unclear how much time he'll actually get -- and it does seem quite reasonable that phishing fraud scams (which actually involve serious fraud and stealing money from people) should get much longer sentences. However, it still seems like 101 years seems a bit on the long side. It will be interesting to see how much time he actually gets, and how long it takes him to convince his fellow inmates to hand over their personal info.Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.
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Yeah. Tard.
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Re: 101 years seems pretty long
I say 99 years would be sufficient.
(It could'a been LIFE!)
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Phishing
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Re: Phishing
He obtained personally identifiable information through fraudulent methods AND stole. That's two separate crimes there bud.
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i won't even get into stories about phishing on aol though... it's all to easy when dealing with the aol user base. :x
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Phishing... and another thing
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Re: Phishing... and another thing
What's you're deal anyway? Some innocent gets screwed because they aren't a web dev and all of a sudden they're at fault that someone ripped them off? That's a real asshole perspective.
If you look at it that way, when you're grandma gets had for everything she's worth cause she tried to buy you a Christmas gift I hope you have a change of heart – otherwise please don't breed; we don't need more of you.
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Tommy 2face
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It's
101 years sounds good to me.
Anybody that says that 101 is too steep never had to go through the hassle of getting their own life back and never had to work years to repair their credit rating.
The problem with society today begins with the lack of consequences.
The same goes for other white collar crimes of enron and mci.
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Re: It's
Someone recently told me how in Japan, if you're caught driving with your cell phone up to your ear, they slap you with a $2000.00 USD fine (that's like 20,000 yen, or something), and they're telling me this and saying how excessive it is. But I agree with it!!
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Fuck em. Swallow the key and let em rot.
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Good Enough
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Re: Good Enough
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Re: Re: Good Enough
Because in China, they simply shoot the worst criminals. Executions of drug dealers are done in sports stadiums.
America has more people in jail because violent criminals are given sentences of 20 or more years, while in many other countries, they are just given sentences of 2-3 years. Many people think Japan is a "safe" country, but sexual predators who rape and kill children are given 2-3 year prison sentences, openly boast to the media that they will do it again, and do it again. There has been talk about sex offender registries or longer sentences, but it remains just talk.
We have more people in prison than almost every other country in the world and crime is still increasing in almost every category.
Which categories? Violent crime has been on a downward trend in the US. Kidnapping in the US is almost extinct. Europe has far higher rates of property crimes than we do.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/US_Crime
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Reply to dorpus
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/US_Crime
Good reference
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Re: Reply to dorpus
How are you defining a "developed" nation, though? Countries such as Russia, Brazil, South Africa, or Thailand all have highways, skyscrapers, subways, high-tech industries, and aerospace industries; their rates of violent crime are several times higher than the US.
Canadians are raped 2.4 times more often than Americans, Australians are rape 2.6 times more often.
http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/cri_rap_percap-crime-rapes-per-capita
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Re: Re: Reply to dorpus
On another note why are you using only one offense to define crime levels? You do understand that rape isn’t the only crime people are committing right? You shouldn’t make a decision about an issue then find information to prove your point it is a very ignorant way to perceive things.
Try this link http://www.fbi.gov/ucr/ucr.htm
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Re: Good Enough
You'd think so wouldn't you. But in fact there are still a relatively small number of operators in this field and the international criminal justice system (insofar as it exists) is practically inert in tackling them. That is why you see draconian sentences, they are effectively an admission by the authorities that they are powerless (or under-resourced and poorly motivated), hence the exagerated chest beating.
But it doesn't work like that. There is an English expression, "In for a penny, in for a pound". What that means, from a criminals point of view, is that harsh sentences have no bearing. Factors influencing the prevalence of non-violent impersonal crime are dominated by the rewards and the likelyhood of arrest. Motives and deterrents alone are not sufficient to explain the crime, unlike murder (passion), manslaughter (fear), child molestation (sexual deviance). These all have well understood motives and usually occur between two actors, perpetrator and victim. But mass fraud, spamming, phishing and other electronic frauds are a really quite a different animal. They are perpetrated by people who do not see themselves as "criminals" but as legitimate businessmen, or politically motivated saboteurs, or corporate/industrial saboteurs. There is a huge grey area where the skullduggery of fraudsters overlaps with the behaviour of corporations and governments, particularly data gathering groups.
At least get it out of the controlled areas, like many European countries and USA/Canada, etc
That's the problem. While the above areas are "controlled", the bases from which fraudsters operate are not. In a way this is payback for bad foriegn policies. Countries we bomb and bully tend to become havens for electronic fraudsters, because their governments turn a blind eye and offer no reciprocal police cooperation, or are actually involved in financing and backing them. If we behaved in a decent way towards other nations we could negotiate proper agreements and they would quickly round up criminals who operate from their soil.
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DOH!
That isn't bad, for him.
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Re: DOH!
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next time
but this is the lesser part, what about the credit card companies who don't just send out notifying letters to costumers for payment confirmation, before actually paying the damn things ? so that all should be protected...
well, just jail the idiot who thought he can go on unpunished , but have his time fit the crime, not his lifetime.
just 2c from me (btw since when unarmed robbery has so high esteem from ???? ) because, in the end, that's what this guy did...
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Where'd that big picture go?
I'm sure that they are just trying to send the message that if you phish and get caught you'll be punished to the maximum extent of the law. Which is fine by me-- I personally think that Rape and 1st degree murder need far longer sentences than they have now anyway.
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101 years?
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Never own or use a computer
True, this is all difficult to monitor but just like sex-offender lists, fraud lists could be compiled to deter con men like this.
If that doesn't work, next time chop off their fingers.
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take a breath
Focus on actually having useful commentary please.
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...
First, the sentence could be up to 101 years. Will this person receive such a sentence? He is scheduled to be sentenced on June 11 and he was arrested a year ago. A link in the article said that he faces a maximum penalty of 30 years. This is a year later, and the prosecutors must have increased what time he is up against.
The real question of reality: is he going to receive more than 30 years?
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Would like to add...
that the US violent crime rates are at the lowest in 30 years. Even the rest of the crime rates are at all time lows. Now, I am not a supporter of drugs but drug arrests are on the rise.
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Re: Would like to add...
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Re: Re: Would like to add...
Follow the links (:
One would be lead to believe that the Bureau of Justice Statistics is credible.
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Way too long
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Re: Way too long
Way too long by Nasty Old Geezer on Jan 17th, 2007 @ 6:18am
to wait for justice. Just shoot the SOB and bury him next to the spammer.
====================
I am with you buddy!
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101 years is nothing..
If each phishing success yielded $300(making it a felony in most states) and he got 1,000 or more people per offense...he's lucky to not be serving 1,000 years. He'll be out after serving 25% of his time so why's everyone crying? I'd only cry if he were innocent or being put into a maximum security prison, but he's not innocent and he's being put into a federal prison. BAH!!
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Actual time
The article states multiple crimes. So if he defrauded 50 people and got two years for each count that would sound more reasonable. Also pointed out that he will probably serve each count at the same time. So he may be in jail for a few years then back out to get some more free stuff until he gets caught again.
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101 years too long
What about a box on your tax forms: Check here if you would like one dollar of your tax money to help fund the international internet fraud attack squads.
leroy
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Re: 101 years too long
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Burn him @ the Stake !!
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Since there is no such thing as an
when he said (back in May of 2003 ):"What we need are a
couple of good hangings."
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Honestly
101 years isn't enough for sombody who had fun and enjoyment from screwing over thousands of people. he should be beaten and gaged, then giveing about 500 year sentence. and he should also spend that entire time in prison with the most openly homos out there.. in a private cell with about 4 of them
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Good!
101 years sounds about right, and I hope he gets ass raped repeatedly by several large inmates while he's there!
And no, I didn't fall victim to some phisher, it all started when I was 13, which should be a red flag in itself to stupid ass credit bureaus!
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Nope
I didn't.
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Let's be Realistic
Hopefully he will have learned his lesson and even more hopefully, others will think twice about trying their own phishing scam.
This will not stop true criminals from phishing but it just may help deter some kiddies from becoming a criminal.
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not long enough...
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101 years is not enough
Certainly it was not goodness. Most likely, the perp did not consider for a moment the hurt he could cause by stealing someones identity, credit card. That, good people, is the very definition of sociopathy. His actions were no different from those of mass murderers. He is a menace to society and no amount of prison time is enough to change his personality. Sociopathy cannot be cured.
So, what is the solution? Execution. Yup. That works.
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AOL phising
May I interset you in a new, one (per week) only offer. All you need to do is reply to this email with your bank adnd credit card information to recieve a potential debt of several thousand dollars, the proceeds of which will ultimately benefit myself.
I hope to recieve your details soon,
Yours sincerely,
***
(professional scammer)
THat sould do the trick for AOL users.
!)! years serves him right for not going to somewhere that does not care about phishing scammers, where he could havem ade his mint and returned home if he felt like it after a few years. Much more sensilbe, and less likely to lead to jail.
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The Punishment Should Fit the Crime
For example, if he was forced to read all of the spam thrown at me in a week ... it would take just about 101 years.
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shit
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Re: shit
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