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Internet crime activity increases greatly

by on04 April 2008

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Up $40 million from 2006


The Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3), a joint collaboration of the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and National White Collar Crime Center (www.NW3C.org) has just released its statistics for 2007 Internet crime losses. The IC3 claims that 2007 saw a $40 million increase over reported losses in 2006.

The most commonly reported crime in 2007 was Internet auction fraud, along with non-delivery of merchandise and payment. Credit and debit card fraud, check fraud and computer fraud comprised about 18% of all referred complaints.

The IC3 claims that it began reporting statistics in 2001 and that Internet crime costs have increased from $17.8 million in 2001 to $240 million in 2007.  The top ten cybercrime U.S. States rank with California first, followed by Florida, New York, Texas, Illinois, Pennsylvania, Georgia, Ohio, Washington and New Jersey. 

The top ten cybercrime countries were the United States by a wide margin, with United Kingdom, Nigeria, Canada, Romania, Italy, Spain, South Africa, Russia and Ghana following.  The majority of the cybercrime perpetrators were from the United States, but a significant number of perpetrators were located in the U.K., Nigeria, Canada, Romania and Italy.

The IC3 claims that the two primary mechanisms of Internet fraud were by e-mail and Web pages, with the highest activity scams in 2007 involving pets, checks, spam and online dating Web sites.

Let the buyer beware (caveat emptor) is still a good phrase to remember: when something sounds too good to be true, it usually is.

Last modified on 04 April 2008
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