U.S. Government Licenses FTC to Pursue Overseas Spammers

Internet crime is often difficult to catch because it can transgress geographical borders by just a click of the mouse. To battle this problem out President Bush has recently signed a law, which authorizes and licenses the Federal Trade Commission to chase the problem and overcome it.

The FTC presented its recommendations to the Congress saying unscrupulous businesses use Internet and long-distance telephone technology to strike on a massive scale, make thousands, victims to their deceptive acts, and get away with their ill-gotten profits without leaving any clues. For instance spammers conceal their identities, while sending out manipulative e-mail messages from any part of the world to any person in the world. Fraudulent overseas telemarketers can target and succeed in attacking American consumers and still hide their ill-gotten earnings in offshore banks.

The Undertaking Spam, spyware and Fraud Enforcement jointly with Enforces of the Borders Act 2006, alternatively the U.S. SEFE WEB Act 2006, S-1608 gives FTC the authority to aid and consult information with law enforcement agencies in foreign countries. It provides the way to keep information confidential and delay notification at the time of requesting to know about fraudulent activities of suspected criminals while protecting private sector entities that volunteer information.

The FTC had been striving since three years to get new powers, believing that it'll help to crack spammers' activities such as some Nigerians who send out e-mails to thousands of people everyday with their sad tales and promises of wealth to those who offer their kind help. Those e-mails are more than just an irritant as is evident from the loss of $42,000 that a 76-year old Florida woman suffered in the scam in 2006.

People spamming mails or launching attacks using treacherous programs with the ability to steal private information increasingly operate from countries of Eastern Europe, Southeast Asia and Africa.

The FTC estimated that U.S.' incidents of Internet fraud was four times higher to 44,310 in 2005 over 10,906 in 2002. But the Commission feels those figures understate the problem because the complainants did not know if the fraud happened at home or outside.

Related article: U.S. Businesses Lose $712 Per Worker Due to Spam

» SPAMfighter News - 1/4/2007