Credit card fraudsters are using the technologies of the Internet and instant messaging to create a virtual network for the distribution of automated aids to Web site attack and to trade in stolen credit card information.
This paper from the Honeynet Project - a non-profit research organisation of security professionals dedicated to information security - demonstrates just how easy and widespread credit card fraud and identity theft has become as researchers follow an online criminal trail across multiple IRC channels and semi-covert Web sites.
The paper suggests that barriers to entry for inexperienced and neophyte fraudsters are dropping all the time as the community becomes more organised, leading to a significant increase in the dollar volume of related crime.
By presenting their activities as a lifestyle choice rather than criminal fraud, members of the carding community entice others to join them. They pose a growing threat to the financial community, online merchants, and individual cardholders, suggests the paper.
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