Internet Crime Forums Pose a Serious Threat to All of Us

Hacker (Internet Crime Forums) are fueling the identity theft business. These forums facilitate (for a price), selling personal financial information and even (whole) identities.

TopTechNews did an interesting story on this problem, where they say:

The cybercrime forums gird a criminal economy that robs U.S. businesses of $67.2 billion a year, according to an FBI projection.

According to the article - the sites are now being hosted in rogue countries like Iran - which the crooks consider beyond the reach of the authorities.

Here is what the TopTechNews article reported:

At USA TODAY's request, CardCops traced CardersMarket's point of origin and confirmed that it is registered to a computer server in Iran.

If Iceman succeeds in establishing CardersMarket as the Wal-Mart of forums, its routing through an Iranian server will make an already complex law enforcement challenge that much more difficult, security experts say.

"Chasing these carding fraudsters is like chasing terrorists in Afghanistan," says RSA Security's Einav. "You know they are somewhere out there, but finding their caves, their underground bunkers, is almost impossible."

TopTechNews story, here.

The article highlights that there is action being taken against these "criminals," but it also points out that experts say with the amount of compromised information being "bought and sold" on these sites, identity theft could multiply by a factor of twenty.

Since these groups seem to do business with rogue countries that support terrorism (Iran). Maybe we should start considering them as "enemies of the people" and "supporters of terrorism."

Perhaps this "label" would facilitate more effort into putting them where they belong, or "where the sun don't shine."