Teaching Handout of Lesson 21

I Background Information
Crime ring (1) 犯罪团伙
the go-go ’90s (1) 活跃的 90 年代
Willie Sutton (2) 银行大盗 威利萨顿;; celebrated American bank robber
and prison escapee who earned his nickname “the Actor” because of his talent for disguises; 自传
Where the Money Was
spam, phishing, cyber-extortion, trafficking (4) 垃圾邮件，网络钓鱼，网络敲诈，走私
money laundering, counterfeiting (5) 洗钱，伪造
Crime syndicate (12) 犯罪辛迪加；犯罪集团
loan sharking (12) 高利贷
U.S. Rep. R.-Texas (13) 众议院议员，民主党人-德克萨斯州
IPO (17) 首次公开募股
distributed denial-of-service attack (17) 分布式拒绝服务攻击；借助于客户、服务器技术,将多个计
算机联合起来作为攻击平台，对一个或多个目标发动 ddos 攻击，从而成倍提高拒绝服务攻击的威力。
Western Union (17) 西联汇款，是世界上领先的特快汇款公司，迄今已
有 150 年的历史，它拥有全球最大最先进的电子汇兑金融网络，代理网点遍布全球近 200 个国
家和地区。
Itar-Tass news agency (18) 塔斯社；俄罗斯国家通讯社，是苏联国家通讯社，国际
性通讯社之一。
Authorize. Net (19) 支付网关服务商。它允许商家通过自己的网站和通过 IP
（互联网协议）连接接口进行信用卡和电子支票支付。公司声称拥有超过 40 万客商，这将使其
成为互联网上最大的支付网关服务商。公司于 1996 年由一位企业家和信用卡代理实体商人杰
夫·诺尔斯在犹他州创立。
Grand-jury (petty jury) (23) 大陪审团 12-23 人 (小陪审团 12 人）
Ingram Micro in Santa Ana, Calif. (23) 英迈；成立于 1979 年，总部位于美国加利
福尼亚州圣塔安纳。全球最大的技术分销商，也是全球领先的技术销售，营销和物流公司。
Softbank Capital Partners (28) 软银；成立于 1995 年,是一家日本的风险投资机构,主要
关注与手机]、互联网和技术相关的公司。
Cashier’s checks (Bank check) (34) 银行本票
Secrete Service (35) 特工处，隶属于国土安全部
Department of Homeland Security (38) 国土安全部
Industry observers (experts; analysts) (38) 业内人士；业内观察员
PricewaterhouseCoopers (42) 普华永道会计师事务所，是世界上最顶级的会计师事
务所之一。在福布斯全球排行榜上，普华永道位列全球私有企业的第三名，普华永道也是
国际四大会计师事务所之一，与其并列的其他三大所分别是毕马威、德勤和安永。

II Pre-reading: language focus

A. Words
Feed (3) frenzy (3) shoddy (4) far-flung (4)
savvy (4) offshore (5) illicit (6) perpetrate (6)
divulge (7) gouge (7) convict (9) carry (12)
accomplice (13) exploit (13) shakedown (15) downplay (20)
 withering (20) enlist (21) indictment (23) alias (24)
fraudulent (24) extradite (25) spook (29) overhead (30)
dabble (in) (31) bust (31) entail (32) outlay (33)
heft (35)

B. Phrases
Be a natural fit (5) branch into (5) under siege (6)
Trick sb into doing…(7) beef up (9) run the gamut from…to… (22)
Bear the brunt of…(26) be loath to do…(29) a flurry of activity (35)
Wend through (35) be convicted of… (37) spiral out of control (38)
Coordinate…with… (38) make a dent (40) inundate…with… (41)

III First reading: general understanding of the text

Title:                                 Crooks Find Net Fertile Ground for Cyber Crimes
A. Overall situation of cybercrimes                           (1-6)
  1. Fast increase of cybercrimes                       1-2
  2. Conditions for cybercrimes
a. Internet’s fast growth                             3
b.    1     computer security and ability to commit crimes from far-flung countries   4
c. Suitable means for crime    2                 5-6
 
B.   3    caused by cybercrimes                          (7)
 
C. Impact of cybercrimes on law enforcement          (8-10)
  1. Triggering changes in law enforcement
  2. FBI’s investigations of 2700 cybercrime-related cases
 
D. Factors for the fast growth of cybercrimes           (11-13)
  1. Internet’s fast expansion and chaotic situation
  2. Advantages of cybercrimes over other kinds of crimes
a. Relative    4    , less violence, lighter penalties
b. Easy    5     across continents without meeting
 
E. Forms of cybercrimes                                                 (14-33)
  1. Extortion
a.   6     of cyber-extortion                                        15
 b. Targets of cyber-extortion                                    16
c. Specific examples of cyber-extortion                   17-20
d. Increasing    7     of cyber-extortion                      21
  2. Frauds
a. Ways of frauds                                                      22
b. Specific examples of frauds                                 23-25
c. Targets of Internet-related frauds                        26-29
  3. Phishing
a. Sharp    8    in phishing                                       30
b. Specific examples of phishing                           31-32
c. Elaborate shipping network for expensive goods from fraudulent online buyers    33-34-
 
F. Congress’s efforts to solve the problem of cybercrimes               (35-39)
  1.Introduction of    9    outlawing phishing and banning spyware                           35-37
  2. Rep. Thornberry’s view on the need to act quickly and beef up cyber-security  38-39
 
G. Author’s comment                                                            (40-42)
  1. Mixed results of the Can-Spam law                                                                          40-41
  2. No    10    of the law on criminals who have fled the U.S. for other countries          42

IV Second reading: detailed understanding of the text

A. Analysis and translation of well-crafted sentences

1. Organized crime rings and petty thieves are flocking to the Internet like start-ups in the go-go
’90s, federal authorities say -- establishing a multibillion-dollar underground economy in just a
few years. (1)

2. Crime syndicates and the Internet are a natural fit, security experts say. Both are global, thrive
on flexible networks and require specialization. (5)

3. The FBI, in the midst of beefing up its cyber-division, is investigating 2, 700 cyber crime-
related cases nationwide, two-thirds of them opened in the past year. Of those cases, 346
individuals have been convicted. (9)

4. Authorize. Net downplayed the attacks, but some of its customers said the withering assaults
were costly. (20)

5. In one of the largest Internet fraud investigations, the FBI and international law enforcement
authorities in August obtained a federal grand-jury indictment of a suspected Romanian computer
hacker and five Americans on charges they conspired to steal more than $10 million in computer
equipment from distributor Ingram Micro in Santa Ana, Calif. (23)
6. Big banks and credit card companies are bearing the brunt of Internet-related fraud. More than
60% of computer hacks targeted financial institutions last year, says market researcher IDC. (26)

7. The most recent bust was of a high-level member on June 4 who is allegedly in charge of the
ring's money laundering, the Department of Justice says. (31)

8. Nearly a year after the first federal anti-spam law, bills wending through the House and Senate
would give cyber crime fighters more heft and would outlaw phishing and ban spyware, the
irritating software that quietly monitors the activities of Internet users. (35)

9. Whether any of the bills make a dent as law is debatable, given the mixed results of the national
Can-Spam law. (40)

B．Statements for discussion

1. Is it sensible for the banks to quietly eat losses from cyber-frauds?

2. Can legislation solve the problem of cybercrime?

 Lesson 21     Crooks Find Net Fertile Ground for Cyber Crime

Web allows gangs to devise new ways to commit old crimes

By Jon Swartz

1. SAN FRANCISCO Organized crime rings and petty thieves are flocking to the Internet like
start-ups in the go-go ’90s, federal authorities say -- establishing a multibillion dollar underground
economy in just a few years.

2. “Willie Sutton used to say he robbed banks because that's where the money is,” says FBI Agent
Keith Lourdeau, an expert on cyber crime. “The same applies today to crooks and the Internet.”

3. The Internet’s growth as an economic engine, particularly for financial transactions, is feeding
the felonious frenzy.

4. Lured by shoddy computer security and the ability to commit crimes from far-flung countries,
the Russian mafia and other Eastern European gangs are plunging into spam, phishing schemes,
cyber-extortion and the trafficking of stolen goods online, authorities say. Many hire hackers in
economically depressed countries, but a growing number are becoming computer savvy to do the
dirty work themselves.

5. Crime syndicates and the Internet are a natural fit, security experts say. Both are global, thrive
on flexible networks and require specialization. The Net has allowed offshore gangs to branch
into other ventures while devising new ways to commit old crimes, such as money laundering
and counterfeiting.

6. Criminals shop on illicit computer bulletin boards for stolen credit card numbers as they would
for books on Amazon. com. They threaten devastating electronic attacks on Web sites unless they
are paid. Online bank accounts are under siege. And millions of hijacked computers, or zombies --
infected with malicious code under the control of a hacker without the owner's knowledge--
perpetrate the schemes without a trail.

7. Consumers and businesses, as a consequence, lost at least $14 billion to digital thieves last year,
although most of the crimes went undetected or unreported, experts say. Spam alone accounted for
$ 10 billion, Ferris Research says. Fraud cost online merchants $2 billion more, Gartner Research
says. And phishing -- fraudulent e-mail messages and Web sites designed to trick consumers into
divulging personal information--gouged consumers by $2 billion in the 12-month period ended in
April, Gartner says.

8. The surge in cyber crime has triggered changes not only in criminal behavior but also in law
enforcement.

9. The FBI, in the midst of beefing up its cyber-division, is investigating 2, 700 cyber crime-
related cases nationwide, two-thirds of them opened in the past year. Of those cases, 346
individuals have been convicted.

10. “This is more sophisticated stuff than purse snatching,” FBI Agent Tom Grasso says.

Crime.com

11. Computer crime has never been so lucrative. With the Internet as ubiquitous as cable TV,
there are millions of potential victims banking and shopping online. Contributing to the chaos:
security flaws in business, home and university computers, and few effective cyber crime laws in
the USA and abroad.

12. What is more, homeland-security measures designed to tighten U. S. borders and fortify
physical infrastructure may have drawn crime syndicates to technologies, which is relatively
invisible, security experts say. “Crooks like the Internet because it is less violent and carries
lighter penalties than loan sharking and drugs," Grasso says.

13. What makes online endeavors particularly attractive is that crooks and their accomplices don't
have to meet. They can collaborate across continents and exploit the computers of innocent
bystanders to carry out their crimes. U. S. Rep. Mac Thornberry, R-Texas chairman of the
Homeland Security Committee's cyber-security subcommittee, compares the problem to the rise of
street gangs in the 1920s and 1930s.

14. Cyber-crooks are focusing on:

15. Extortion. What started out as a digital shakedown of gambling Web sites has expanded,
federal authorities say.

16. Nearly one-fifth of 100 small and midsize companies polled this summer say they have been
targets of cyber-extortion threats, according to a survey by Carnegie Mellon University's H. John
Heinz III School of Public Policy and Management and Information Week magazine.

17. Banks and companies planning initial public stock offerings are the latest targets or the data
targets of shadowy hackers, who demand $20,000 to $ 50,000 for protection from distributed
denial-of-service attacks, which bombard and paralyze a Web site with data. Often, the e-mail
threats are issued shortly before an attack, demanding that cash be sent to a Western Union office
overseas.

18. In July, young Russian hackers were arrested for operating an extortion ring that for nearly a
year cost British banks as much as $73 million in lost business and damages, government officials
in Russia told Itar-Tass news agency"

19. In an attack in the USA last month, the Web site of Authorize. Net, a processor of credit card
transactions for thousands of small and midsize businesses, was hit for several days, disrupting
service. Authorize. Net rejected several e-mails demanding a "significant amount" of money, says
David Schwartz, a spokesman. An unknown number of zombie computers were used in the attack,
he said. The FBI is investigating.

20. Authorize. Net downplayed the attacks, but some of its customers said the withering assaults
were costly. “I lost $15,000,” says David Hoekje, president of PartsGuy.com, an online retailer of
heating and air-conditioning parts.

21. As cyber-extortion grows, attacks are becoming more sophisticated. Some extortionists
monitor how their targets defend themselves, so they can alter attacks. They enlist new zombie
computers unfamiliar to the company under siege or change the type of data used in an electronic
assault.

22. Fraud. The most fertile online territory for crooks runs the gamut from credit card theft and
phishing to electronic burglary schemes.

23. In one of the largest Internet fraud investigations, the FBI and international law enforcement
authorities in August obtained a federal grand-jury indictment of a suspected Romanian computer
hacker and five Americans on charges they conspired to steal more than $10 million in computer
equipment from distributor Ingram Micro in Santa Ana, Calif.

24. The indictment charges that Calin Mateias, 24, using the alias Dr. Mengele, hacked into
Ingram's online ordering system and placed fraudulent orders for computer equipment. The order
directed the equipment be sent to dozens of addresses throughout the USA .

25. Mateias may be extradited to the USA from Romania. The American suspects are awaiting
trial.

26. Big banks and credit card companies are bearing the brunt of Internet-related fraud. More than
60% of computer hacks targeted financial institutions last year, says market researcher IDC.

27. About 30 million credit card numbers have been stolen through computer-security breaches
since 1999, resulting in $ 15 billion in losses, according to the FBI.

28. “It's like picking someone’s pocket before they enter the bank,” says Bill Burnham, managing
partner at venture firm Softbank Capital Partners.

29. Banks are loath to discuss break-ins out of fear of spooking customers and are willing to
quietly eat losses from fraud, says security consultant John Frazzini, a former U. S. Secret Service
agent.

30. Federal authorities in the USA and Great Britain also note a sharp rise in phishing by
organized crime as it recognizes how much money can be made with little or no overhead.
31. A three-year investigation by the FBI and England's National Hi-Tech Crime Unit has led to
the arrest of 30 members of an Eastern European crime ring accused of dabbling in phishing and
ID theft. The most recent bust was of a high-level member on June 4 who is allegedly in charge of
the ring's money laundering, the Department of Justice says.

32. Another popular scam entails an elaborate shipping network for expensive goods purchased
online with stolen credit cards.

33. Fraudulent online buyers in West Africa have goods shipped to Europe, where an accomplice
or legitimate delivery service re-ships the items to West Africa, FBI agents say. Re-shippers are
recruited in chat rooms, online job postings and over the phone. They are either paid with
counterfeit cashier's checks or allowed to keep some merchandise. Though the scheme requires a
cash outlay, it is an inexpensive way to move stolen products without revealing the identity of the
original buyer, agents say.

34. Working with the FBI, Nigerian officials recently seized more than $340, 000 in illegally
obtained online merchandise and recovered $ 115,000 in fraudulent cashier's check issued against
U. S. financial institutions. Nearly 20 people were arrested.

A legislative fix?

35. The computer-crime epidemic has set off a reorganization by agencies such as the FBI and
Secret Service, as well as a flurry of activity in Congress. Nearly a year after the first federal anti-
spam law, bills wending through the House and Senate would give cyber crime fighters more heft
and would outlaw phishing and ban spyware, the irritating software that quietly monitors the
activities of Internet users.

36. An anti-phishing bill recently introduced by Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., would make it a crime
to phish. It carries a $ 250,000 fine and up to five years in jail.

37. On Oct. 7, the House passed the second bill in three days that would outlaw spyware. It carries
a penalty of up to five years in prison for people convicted of installing such programs without a
computer user's permission.

38. “We need to act quickly before this spirals even more out of control," says Rep. Thornberry,
co-author of a bill to create a high-ranking position in the Department of Homeland Security. The
assistant secretary of cybersecurity would coordinate cyber crime busting with private industry
and state and local governments. (Amit Yoran, the nation's cybersecurity chief, abruptly resigned
Oct. I, after a year. He quit, industry observers said, over what he considered a lack of attention
paid to cybersecurity within the department.)

39. And it shouldn't stop there, says Thornberry, who advocates tax incentives and liability
protection for corporations that "beef up" cybersecurity.” Threats and vulnerabilities change in a
matter of seconds,” he says. “Defenses are obsolete unless they’re constantly improved.”
40. Whether any of the bills make a dent as law is debatable, given the mixed results of the
national Can-Spam law. About three-fourths of e-mail monitored in September by e-mail security
company Postini was spam.

41. The law has had another unintended result: Spam operators have fled the USA for other
countries, where they continue to inundate Americans with e-mail for porn and “miracle” drug.

42. “The reality is we are just the U. S., and there are nearly 200 countries connected to the
Internet. Our laws stop at the border," says Jody Westby, a managing director of
PricewaterhouseCoopers' security and privacy practice.

From USA Today, October 21, 2004