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Internet shop at your own risk, says judge
PEOPLE who use the internet for shopping and banking do so at their own risk, a judge warned after hearing how fraudsters targeted thousands of computer users in a global fraud.
Judge Alistair McCallum spoke out yesterday at Leeds Crown Court, saying if the public knew how criminals were stealing their financial information online they would not leave themselves so open to identity theft.
He urged anyone providing personal details over the internet to use extreme caution – and if they used a credit card on a computer, to obtain one with a very low credit rating, to minimise the loss if their identity was stolen.
Judge McCallum gave his warning after jailing fraudster Bryn Wellman for 12 years for his part in two international scams which could have netted the criminals involved up to 16m.
The court heard the first involved credit card information bought from others, while the second also used stolen information, but went further with a Trojan virus sent inside apparently innocent messages to computer users.
Once inside a target computer, the virus would target confidential personal information if entered by the user and pass that back to the criminal.
Wellman was targeting tens of thousands of computers with the Trojan virus. The information he could have received had the potential to cause losses up to 10m.
Judge McCallum said such frauds were undermining the financial security of the country and contributed to "the growing fear ordinary people have of trusting financial institutions" .
The judge said he could not disclose the full details of the case without causing panic but added: "Any person who engages in online banking or uses a credit card to purchase items on the internet does so at his or her own peril."
He insisted, however, that he was not scaremongering, referring to the revelation last week that hackers stole the details of 45.7 million credit and debit card customers of TK Maxx.
Wellman, 35, of South Ferry Quay, Liverpool, admitted conspiracy to defraud.
Jailing him for six years consecutively on the two frauds, the judge said he had been caught for the first fraud in 2004. That had the potential for Wellman and his associates to steal 6m, but fortunately because of quick police action the loss was only 265,839.
However, after being released on bail Wellman began his more sophisticated second fraud.
Fortunately, some police officers were more intelligent than Wellman boasted he was, and they were able to foil his plan.
The judge commended an officer from the Serious Organised Crime Agency for his work in the case, but his identity cannot be revealed.
A second defendant, Alan Lawless, 24, of Queensland Road, Liverpool, was jailed for four years after admitting conspiracy to defraud.
After the credit card details were obtained, he obtained goods and money with that information for Wellman.
Jenny Carter-Manning, prosecuting, told the judge at an earlier hearing that police arrested Wellman at a house in Liverpool on January 17 last year, after he had first been bailed in December 2004.
After two computers were seized along with laptops last year, inquiries revealed Wellman had resumed his criminal activities.
A large amount of credit card and bank account information was found on the computers including passwords, billing addresses and credit card security numbers.
There were also details of spoof banking websites designed to deceive the public into supplying their own confidential details.
First be bought hundreds of credit details from other criminals as far afield as Vietnam and Russia. Then he bought and deployed the Trojan programme, which was capable of obtaining personal information directly. Thirdly, he used the financial data to get money or high value goods.
The Trojan programme was "sent to other computers without permission, effectively slipping in as a virus", the court heard.
It would sit undetected in the unsuspecting user's computer, recording keystrokes and transmitting confidential information such as credit card numbers back to the fraudster.
The Yorkshire Post revealed last year that around 65,000 people were victims of identity fraud in Britain, including 3,400 in Yorkshire.
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Saturday 11 February 2012
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