ScamsOnline

Spam King Busted by Secret Service

Adam Vitale, aka Batch1 aka Baxter, 25, of Boynton Beach, FL, and his partner Todd Moeller, aka M3rk, of New Jersey, are accused of sending nearly 50,000 pieces of spam e-mail to more than 1.2 million AOL subscribers. US Secret Service agents used a confidential informant to hire Moeller and Vitale to deliver spam, which advertised a computer security product.

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You have been admitted to UCBerkeley Law school - NOT!

This is not a scam. It is a pure case of human error, more properly known as user stupidity.

Edward Tom, director of admissions at the University of California, Berkeley, law school, was training a new office worker last week when it happened...

Money for nothing

Hundreds of new sites are trading on web users' ignorance by selling inadequate or unnecessary technical support for free software.

Austelle describes herself as "a frequent internet user" who checks her email daily, participates in forums, and has multiple online accounts. But that did not stop her falling for a new loophole by which sites provide software that's available free elsewhere - and charge for "support" that may be limited or even nonexistent.

Convicted data thief gets eight years

A bulk e-mailer who looted more than a billion records with personal information from a data warehouse has been sentenced to eight years in prison, federal prosecutors said Wednesday.

Scott Levine, 46, was sentenced by a federal judge in Little Rock, Ark., after being found guilty of breaking into Acxiom's servers and downloading gigabytes of data in what the U.S. Justice Department calls one of the largest data heists to date. Acxiom, based in Little Rock, says it operates the world's largest repository of consumer data, and counts major banks, credit card companies and the U.S. government among its customers.

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New Internet Scam Targets Online Sellers

The warnings about Internet scams are almost as numerous as the scams themselves, but lately a new scheme has been duping even the most experienced computer users.

Crooks on the Internet have been posing as middlemen, targeting anyone selling a high-priced item online.

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New lottery scam

The Better Business Bureau wants to warn you about foreign lottery scams that are being run in many areas.

The BBB said there's a new twist to the scam. Con artists are now sending out checks with lottery offers. The folks who receive them are told they have to cash the checks and then wire the money back, in order to collect their winnings. The problem is, the checks aren't worth the paper they're printed on.

AT&T Overcharging Troops

Here is an article on how AT&T overcharges our troops in the middle-east. The overcharging of American soldiers for calls from Iraq and Afghanistan, as first reported in The Prepaid Press in January 2005, has caught the eye of a powerful organization: the American Legion.

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Independent Committee of Eminent Persons (ICEP)

Have you heard the phrase "If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is"? There is a scam floating around on the Internet that certainly qualifies. It claims that the strangely titled (and fictitious) "Independent Committee of Eminent Persons" has found millions of dollars that you can claim.

The scam e-mail is humorous. Here are some of the claims:

WinFixer

There is a website called WinFixer that attempts to install software on your computer to make it run faster. When you click on the "Cancel" button you will be taken to the website and presented with another opportunity to click on the "Install" button again.

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Bank of America Screws Over Mom, Lets Identity Thief Continue to use Fake ID since “He Pays on Time!”

Margaret Harrison, a young wife and mother living in San Diego, found out a laborer named Pablo has been using her Social Security number. Bank of America sent her a new debit card bearing her name and Pablo's picture! Margaret says the Bank of America claims it can't take any action against Pablo because he pays his bills on time

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