On July 4, 2017 A United States Attorney for the District of Connecticut let the world know that a man behind a phishing scam plead guilty. Michael Richo, 35, plead guilty to fraud and money laundering offenses in federal court. This scheme was an attempt to steal more than $370,000 worth in Bitcoin from his phishing victims. He also had over 10,000 passwords and usernames. Once he had the victim hooked through his phishing scheme, he would simply wait for the victim to deposit Bitcoin. Once the Bitcoin was on the compromised account (Without the knowledge to the victim), Michael Richo would simply withdraw the Bitcoin into his own wallet.
“A Wallingford man has pleaded guilty to fraud and money laundering charges connected to a scheme to steal more than $365,000 worth of bitcoins on the dark web, according to federal officials. Michael Richo, 35, of Wallingford, waived his right to be indicted and pleaded guilty today in Hartford federal court, according to Deirdre Daly, United States Attorney for the District of Connecticut.” - http://www.nbcconnecticut.com
Michael Richo acknowledged through the guilty plea that he would place links on marketplaces and dark web forums. This was obviously said by him so who knows where else he put these links. This brings up the issue of phishing on STEEM. Please verify the links you click on and take cation when anyone sends you links you don't recognize. You also need to be aware of links from people you know because you may not realize that they are compromised. This is a common tactic of phishing scams. One person will click the phishing link and become compromised then the phishing code sends the same phishing link to everyone else on their friends list/address book. Then the process continues until stopped by another force.
“Federal officials said that by pleading guilty, Richo admitted that he posted fake links to online marketplaces on dark web forums, which directed individuals to a fake login page that looked like the real login pages for the various online marketplaces.” - http://www.nbcconnecticut.com
Https:// is a great indicator to see if something is “fishy”. Say you see https://Google.com and now visiting the same site days later you see it as http://Google.com this should be a red flag. Obviously, I used google as an example but the example is clear. Know that this doesn't always mean it's a bad thing, the website owner could have just forgotten to renew their https:// certificate. Another growing threat are “URL shortened” URLs. You usually see these as “goo.gl”, “ow.ly”, or in another variation. These shortened links will forward you to what ever destination the creator of the link input. This is very dangerous because many people trust these types of links without hesitation. The majority of people that create the short URLs have no alternative motive but there are always dark actors abusing this trust. Please be aware of what you click online!
Be safe,
- Citizen
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