According to a report by the New York Times, the FBI has launched its "Operation Phish Phry" and just arrested 53 people suspected of being involved in a major case of fraud on Internet phishing. These arrests took place in Southern California, Nevada and North Carolina. For its part, Egypt is poised to arrest 47 people found complicit in these criminal actions including Internet activities.
The report charges these people were deceived users to collect their bank details and get in at least 2 million dollars. This case would have started in 2007 until September 2009. According to the FBI, is the first time so many of those arrested are mixed with one such case. The victims of this wave of phishing were clients of two of the country's biggest banks: Bank of America and Wells Fargo.
In the traditional way of phishing, email received seemed legitimate and come from the banks in question and offered a link to a fraudulent website mimicking that of the financial institution. From this page the user was prompted to enter their personal and financial information. The stolen money was paid into the bank accounts of pirates based in the United States, which then transferred a portion of these funds to associates based in Egypt. "Everything was very well done, very well thought out and everyone was paid," says Bolcar, head of the FBI in Los Angeles.
At the head of this network, we found Kenneth Joseph Lucas, a young man of 25 years helped by John Clarke and Nichole Merz. All 53 people arrested could face up to 20 years imprisonment.
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