Michael Gracie

Techdirt notes that infamous spammer Alan Ralsky is rumored to have been busted and is now behind bars. Furthermore, the talk is he may sing, meaning more arrests could follow.

The chatter is running on this thread at news.admin.net-abuse.email (via Google Groups), as is the skepticism.

It is known that Ralsky was knocked off his spam king perch months ago (after a previous FBI raid), nevertheless, a DOJ press release would help a lot right now.
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Phishers have decided that rather than point someone to a fake website, why not give them a phone number to call for the purpose of grabbing account information.

The article pointed to VoIP, but it isn’t really the culprit here. Voice over IP services just make the job a little easier for the scammers to get started, while making their tracks easier to cover.

Webroot recently reported a dramatic rise in spyware incidents, most of it targeting financial data. While the company’s report may be biased, the fact that spyware has roots in commercial enterprised (i.e. adware) means there are more people working on the stuff. The fact that viruses are generally individual endeavors means they will take a back seat.

But why all the extra attention? Well, if you are going out looking for internet users to scam, would you rather target the educated (and protected), or the clueless?

It’s hard to believe that spammers would get their highest response rates from pornography. That was a joke - of course sex sells.

No surprises there. Or here.

NewsFactor has a laundry list of action items to protect against online ID theft. I’d say you can read the subheader and get the gist:

Ultimately, while technology can help protect you, the fight against identity theft must be fought with common sense, informed caution, and a solid understanding of what you are up against.

For those with no common sense, you can: avoid clicks on strange email links, use Firefox, buy lots of anti-virus and anti-spyware software, periodically get your credit report, etc.

UC Berkeley knows stolen laptops, and stolen laptops are an ID thief’s dream come true.

No wonder the school is trying to tighten up its security act.

The University of Texas announced Sunday that their computer systems had been breached and a ton of personal records had been compromised.

This type of news usually means that I would be kicking the crap out someone, but in this case it is anything but. Within two days of the breach (they found out last Friday), UT had let the word out. By Monday morning they were analyzing the damage toll, setting up hotlines for prospective victims (see the numbers below), and generally jumping through hoops to make sure their “customers” were protected. They announced, they warned, they took responsibility.

The University of Texas officials didn’t hide, point fingers or engage in any other action you might suspect from a publically funded organization that was subject to a personal data compromise. No, they engaged in logical and tangible damage control instead.

UT deserves kudos for acting in such a highly forthright manner.

Our “friends” in Washington might take note of it as well, as they ponder legislation to similar affects.
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eWeek thinks the anti-virus software market is ripe for consolidation. They cite large players reporting impressive numbers, and small players getting squeezed.

Sounds to me like large players are going to be buying small players at nice discounts. Or small players just fade away. And what about Microsoft, who is hot on the heals of independents in the anti-spyware market - will they jump on anti-virus next?

Maybe in a year or two. While OS X gains popularity, more threats are going to arise. And Mac users’ inability to admit it could exacerbate the problems. Same goes for Linux, although I suspect that Linux desktop users are technically competent, and are apt to take better care of their systems.

The threats may be more than hype. But I now wonder if a little hype is good - the top download off the Apple Software site this week is none other than MacScan.

In the never ending battle against weblog comment and trackback spam, MovableType’s SpamLookup is a gem. I’ve said it before - I use it, and I get very manageable levels of blog spam. Seems I am not alone (again).

Note: Spamroll and its author have absolutely no affiliation with SixApart, other than being a paid licensee of their software.