Yahoo Suit Targets Lottery Scammers

New set of standards could make email more trustworthy

(NEWSER) - A new anti-phishing effort, backed by the big email service providers as well as banks, PayPal, social networks, and other companies, could dramatically reduce the number of scam emails you get in your inbox. Google, Yahoo, Microsoft, and AOL are backing the new plan; 15 companies in total have come together to create DMARC.org, which officially launches today and will promote standard technologies to authenticate email. The hoped-for end result? If you get an email that claims to be from paypal.com, you could trust that it is actually from paypal.com. If it works, companies would be able to communicate with customers in new ways, the Wall Street Journal reports. More»

Social networking site wins another multi-million suit against spammers

(NEWSER) - A Colorado company accused of spamming must pay MySpace $6 million in damages and legal fees after an arbitrator ruled for the social networking site, the AP reports. Media Breakaway and its CEO, aka the "Spam King," were accused of using hijacked or "phished" accounts to send millions of advertising messages to MySpace members. The site has banned the company and its employees. More»

MarketWatch 's tips for avoiding the lure of fraud e-mails

(NEWSER) - We've all learned to avoid the obvious e-mail scams—but sometimes it's just hard to tell. MarketWatch gives you some tips from separating the chaff from the wheat:

1. Know what a phishing scam is: an attempt to con you into supplying ID info, account numbers, names, passwords and so forth. Be wary.
2. Do not reply to requests for financial information initiated by someone else. Legitimate businesses will not ask you supply or "verify" account information.

Ship sinks, can rats be far behind?

(NEWSER) - The first scam has emerged in an apparent bid for compensation from the operators of crippled cruise liner Costa Concordia. A woman and her boyfriend were arrested in Hungary after falsely reporting two people missing on the ship, according to officials. The scheme was spotted by a New York lawyer who is representing six Hungarian survivors from the wreck. He became suspicious when he was contacted by the woman, who asked how much money she could expect for her missing daughter and granddaughter—and kept modifying her story, reports ABC News . More»

Nothing worse than being 'Embarrased' at Western Union, eh?

(NEWSER) - When a scammer hacked a friend of columnist Steve Alexander, he or she probably wasn't expecting to get scammed right back. The Minneapolis Star Tribune writer received a copy of the old “stranded in London” scam email from an acquaintance. The phishing scheme tells the sad tale of a trip to London gone awry in an attempt to get the unassuming victim to wire money via Western Union. Alexander quickly informed his friend he’d been hacked, but then he had some fun. More»