Bin Laden Death Leads to Scam Surge

In the wake of President Barack Obama’s late-night announcement yesterday that the world’s most-wanted fugitive, Osama bin Laden, had been captured and killed, scammers were quick to jump at the opportunity to exploit the news by creating email scams and phishing attacks related to the terrorist leader’s demise.

The newly designed ploys include email scams that contain links or attachments that may redirect users to malicious websites, and fake…

Customers of Online Pharmacies Targeted by Bogus FDA Inspectors

The Food and Drug Administration is warning the public about criminals posing as FDA special agents and other law enforcement personnel as part of a continued international extortion scam targeting consumers who bought drugs online or via telepharmacies.

The criminals call the victims, identify themselves as FDA special agents or other law enforcement officials. The scammers  inform the victims that purchasing drugs over the…

ID Theft, Lottery Schemes Make BBB’s List of 2010 Scams, Rip-Offs

While small-business owners and other consumers were struggling in 2010 to make ends meet, scammers saw a profitable year with pulling off old, proven tricks and adding new ones to their repertoire of swindles.

The Better Business Bureau recently released its top 10 scams and rip-offs, and following, in no particular order, is the tally of schemes that swept the United States in 2010:

Job Hunter Scams – Scams…

Facebook Message Saying Robbed and Stranded? Don’t Fall For It, Says FBI

FBI’s cyber-crime complaint center IC3 continues to receive reports of email or social-networking accounts being compromised and used in a social-engineering scam to swindle consumers out of thousands of dollars.

Pretending to be the victim, the hacker uses victims’ account to send a message to their contacts. The notice claims the victim is in immediate need of money due to being robbed and left stranded in London or some…

Doritos Email Scam Can Cost Snack Maker Millions

Internet scams come in all forms, but fake coupons for free chips? According to Frito-Lay, a bogus coupon for a gratis bag of Doritos has gone viral, leaving consumers enraged when they cannot redeem it.

The Doritos scam–of unknown origin–grew bigger in the past few weeks as more and more people spread the coupon via email. Although a bag of chips may not sound like a big problem, Frito-Lay spokeswoman…

Haitian Disaster May Be Exploited by Cyber Criminals

Security researchers have a tendency to never underestimate the heartlessness of humanity. Following the recent earthquake disaster in Haiti, that has left significant portions of the country in ruins and caused widespread suffering, cyber criminals are set to exploit the disaster with a variety of scams.

A number of websites have already been established about the disaster. While no malicious websites have been detected, security researchers at the SANS Institute…