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Internet Fraud Largely Ignored By US Prosecutors, Report Reveals

by Tim Stevens on August 13, 2008 at 03:15 PM

Internet Fraud Largely Ignored by Prosecutors
According to a recent report by the Center for American Progress (CAP), it's estimated that Internet fraud, whether it be scams or phishing or just plain 'ol spam, cost American consumers a whopping $7.1 billion in 2007. Last year, 20 states tracked complaints from Internet users and, across all the states, 20,000 cases of Internet fraud were reported. Despite these reports, the total number of prosecutions for Internet fraud in 2006 and 2007 combined was a whopping 55, meaning the vast majority of online perps got off without even being investigated.

That's a pretty disappointing success rate, to be sure. Much of the problem stems from the fact that many of these scammers reside in foreign lands, complicating prosecution. But, as we saw recently in the arrest of Albert Gonzalez and his purported international cohorts who stole 41 million credit cards, sometimes international locations aren't enough to dodge the long arm of the law. [Source: Reuters]

Tags: fraud, phishing, scam, spam

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