FBI Reports Fraudulent Activity on Internet Related to Hurricane Katrina

On September 1st, the FBI issued a warning after noting a lot of sites soliciting for charitable donations for the victims of Hurricane Katrina. It is expected that we will see a lot of SPAM e-mails regarding this subject popping up in our inboxes also.

Some of the websites and SPAM could lead to phishing and pharming activity related to identity theft. Of course, they might also lead to charity fraud, or even a combination of both activities.

Here are their recommendations:

• Do not respond to any unsolicited (SPAM) incoming e-mails.
• To ensure contributions to U.S. based non-profit organizations are used for intended purposes, go directly to recognized charities and aid organization’s websites, as opposed to following a link to another site.
• Attempt to verify the legitimacy of non-profit organizations by utilizing various Internet-based resources which may assist in confirming the existence of the organization, as well as its non-profit status.
• Be leery of e-mails claiming to show pictures of the disaster areas in attached files, as the files may contain viruses. Only open attachments from known senders.

If you note any of this activity, please report it at www.IC3.gov.

The victims of Katrina deserve and need our help. It's unfortunate that this disaster has brought out the bad in many people. It is up to all of us to ensure that every dollar donated helps the poor souls, who have suffered a terrible disaster in their lives.

Here is another FBI Alert on the London Bombings. As was done after the Tsumani disaster, the Advance Fee (419) scammers were soliciting for people to claim money for a person who perished in the bombings.

Here is a link to the alert:

http://www.ifccfbi.gov/strategy/wn050822.asp.

Unfortunately, if they haven't started already, I'm sure the Advance Fee (419) scammers will develop a scam for Katrina also.

To view the FBI Alert on Katrina, click on the title of this post.