Known as being one of the largest criminal trends yet, the FBI has captured the gang defrauding its victims of well over a million dollars. This scheme was targeting 60 different countries in its plan to sway internet users into thinking they have been infected and persuading them to buy “fake software” to fix it.
Thought at this time to be somewhere overseas, master-minds and con-artists Shaileshkumar P. Jain and Bkorn Daniel Sundin were amongst the miscreants who created Innovative Marketing Inc. which is a registered company in Belize. This online business claims to distribute anti-virus software as well as do repairs online. The company has been closed down because the FBI has alleged them as being involved in practices of fraud.
There was also a third artist of fraud, James Reno; a young man of 26, from Amelia Ohio. He was in charge of giving technical support to the people who bought this software, which made it look legitimate. Their success came partially from the fact that they used the websites of recognized companies to display their advertisements, which helped win trust. All three men were charged for wire fraud; Jain and Sundin 24 counts, and Reno 12 counts. They also have charges in one count each for computer conspiracy and fraud.
Regarded world wide as an internet fraud that grows more each day designers and creators are making fake software that looks like anti-virus programs and using search engines in order to fool people into purchasing their useless software. Very carefully they are selecting words and adding misspellings that would be the most common used to veer internet users onto sites infected with pretend warnings. When a user lands on the site, a pop up will appear telling the person that their computer has a virus.
Known as “scare-ware” this scam is proving to be highly profitable. These criminals are earning as much as $10,000 per day. A new capability that optimizes a search engine has now allowed this scam to explode with success. A partner set of criminals are involved in this; one compromises web pages by injecting them with all the popular words used in searching, while another partner group does the job of selling the fake software for anti-virus programs.
These criminals are very high-tech and know exactly what they are doing. If one uses any popular words or terms to search for something, the pages that contain the highest amount of those words or terms appear highest in the search engine; thus enhancing the likelihood of “scare-ware” thieves having a superb success rate.
When a person clicks on a page that is infected, that page is immediately redirected over to another site which sells this fake software that claims to be an anti-virus program. Internet users are then persuaded to purchase the phony software, which can cost as much as $50. A number of fake pop-ups appear in the window to prove just how bad you need the program. The score, money wise, has risen 225% in this fraudulent business. The search engines are in the works of developing ways to stop theses scams as quickly as possible. It is advisable not to buy any anti-virus software online, but rather contact a dealer who is legitimately authorized to sell.
Time to fight back and keep on top of the latest scams!
Angelina is an avid Cyber Crimes advocate and pushes for political change in our cyber laws. She has a team of Virtual Assistants who help her run her site and her website as well as manage the many blogs that she runs. If you're interested in Angelina's political initiatives or you would like to find out more on how her Virtual Assistant works,visit her website.