A Melbourne woman who cyber-stalked an American Idol contestant will spend the next year in jail.
Tanya Maree Quattrocchi, 23, hacked into the MySpace account of 2004 runner-up Diana Degarmo and wreaked havoc on the pop singer's life for three years, intercepting her emails and texting her hundreds of times. Today County Court Judge Lisa Hannan sentenced Quattrocchi to 26 months prison, with a non-parole period of 12 months.
Quattrocchi pleaded guilty to four counts of stalking, all committed after she was sentenced to a community-based order for stalking Ms Degarmo in 2006. Judge Lisa Hannan said the offences were without doubt serious and she had no option but to impose jail time.
"It is important that you understand the fact you perpetrated your offending using cyberspace does not diminish its significance," Judge Hannan said.
She said the victims of such crime had no doors to lock and no alarms to activate: "They are constantly vulnerable." She said each of the victims reported feeling anxious, stressed, embarrassed and losing sleep. Quattrocchi sent emails posing as Ms Degarmo to her friends and family, texted her 570 times and called her 369 times in just three months.
But after being sentenced for those crimes in 2007 Quattrocchi returned to stalking Ms Degarmo by sending emails to her victim's relatives and workmates. The court heard the emails gave explicit fictional accounts of Ms Degarmo's sex life. In April last year police seized the family computer at Ms Quattrocchi's Oak Park home and uncovered deleted files relating to Ms Degarmo's website.
Ten days later Quattrocchi was back online tampering with her victim's MySpace account, accessing it 700 times from a city internet cafe over six months. When police arrested her again in January this year she was sitting at a computer, typing out an email pretending to be Ms Degarmo's mother Brenda. The County Court heard Quattrocchi might have Aspergers syndrome and her mother was willing to give up work so she could supervise her full-time.
By Elissa Hunt, Herald Sun, May 29, 2009
Online crime is surging in recession, says report
INTERNET fraud reports have risen for the first time in years and are continuing to surge as the recession deepens, US authorities have warned. Losses from online fraud reported in the US reached a record high $US264 million ($387 million) in 2008, according to a report released this week by the Internet Fraud Complaint Center. And online scams are gathering steam this year, with a nearly 50 per cent increase in complaints reported to US authorities in March alone.
The center is run by the FBI and the National White Collar Crime Center. Most online scams were originating from the US, Canada, Britain, Nigeria and China. "2009 is shaping up to be a very busy year in terms of cyber-crime" said the report's author, John Kane.
Last year's losses compared with $US239 million ($351 million) in 2007 and dwarfs the $US18 million ($26 million) of losses in 2001. The most common complaint of 2008 was non-delivery of promised merchandise, followed by auction fraud, credit card fraud and investment scams, according to the report. Of 275,284 complaints received by the center in 2008, some 72,940 were referred to law enforcement agencies for prosecution.
Those referrals spiked this year with 40,000 in the first quarter alone, said Mr Kane. "It is our belief that these numbers, both the complaints filed and the dollars, represent just a small tip of the iceberg," he said.
By Jason Szep in Boston, Reuters, March 31, 2009
Internet criminals target families
FAMILIES risk being fleeced by cyber criminals as parents use online banking facilities on the same home computers that their children use to chat with their school friends. Internet fraudsters are using "social engineering" - teens are tricked into opening emails or links containing viruses that can then track key strokes - including account log-in details, federal police said yesterday. The social engineering scam begins with amalgamation of information children reveal on social networking sites.
Broadband bandits "spear phish" - conning kids into believing they are a friend via a personalised message. If the child responds, the criminals install malicious software, or "malware", which contains the key-logger. "MySpace, Facebook ... there are hundreds of these sites (on which young) people are posting a lot of personal information without taking the relevant precautions,'' AFP national co-ordinator of high-tech crime operations Peter Sykora said.
"What the cyber criminal will do - and this is a perfect example of social engineering - is they will look at those sites and they will aggregate that data to form a very good picture to spear phish with emails. The internet is a great way for kids to communicate. But parents (should) lockdown their communication so that they invite only the people that they know in there."
"They shouldn't have large amounts of personal information on there - dates of birth, your address. It compromises the whole family unit. This is an education process not only for the adults, but the children." Mr Sykora said while 60 to 70 per cent of cyber fraud attacks came from Eastern Europe and former Soviet bloc countries, the growing threat was from Africa - up from 5 per cent two years ago to 20 per cent now. A 2007 survey by Unisys found Australians were more concerned about the misuse of personal information and credit card theft than national security.
By John Rolfe, The Daily Telegraph, March 31, 2009
Microsoft and TomTom Settle Patent Infringement Cases
Microsoft Corp. and TomTom N.V. today announced that they have settled the patent infringement cases brought by Microsoft before the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington and the International Trade Commission (ITC) and by TomTom in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia.
The cases have been settled through a patent agreement under which TomTom will pay Microsoft for coverage under the eight car navigation and file management systems patents in the Microsoft case. Also as part of the agreement, Microsoft receives coverage under the four patents included in the TomTom countersuit. The agreement, which has a five-year term, does not require any payment by Microsoft to TomTom. It covers both past and future U.S. sales of the relevant products. The specific financial terms of the agreement were not disclosed.
The agreement includes patent coverage for Microsoft's three file management systems patents provided in a manner that is fully compliant with TomTom's obligations under the General Public License Version 2 (GPLv2). TomTom will remove from its products the functionality related to two file management system patents (the "FAT LFN patents"), which enables efficient naming, organising, storing and accessing of file data. TomTom will remove this functionality within two years, and the agreement provides for coverage directly to TomTom's end customers under these patents during that time.
Horacio Gutierrez, corporate vice president and deputy general counsel of Intellectual Property and Licensing, Microsoft Corporation, stated:
"We are pleased TomTom has chosen to resolve the litigation amicably by entering into a patent agreement. Our car navigation patents, which are at the heart of the enhanced auto experience enjoyed by millions of drivers today, have been licensed to many companies, including leaders in the car navigation sector. The file management system patents, which increase file management system efficiency and functionality, have also been licensed by many companies, including those that produce mixed source products.
We were able to work with TomTom to develop a patent agreement that addresses their needs and ours in a pragmatic way. When addressing IP infringement issues, there are two possible paths: securing patent coverage or not using the technology at issue. Through this agreement, TomTom is choosing a combination of both paths to meet the unique needs of its business, and we are glad to help them do so."
Peter Spours, Director of IP Strategy and Transactions at TomTom N.V., stated:
"This agreement puts an end to the litigation between our two companies. It is drafted in a way that ensures TomTom's full compliance with its obligations under the GPLv2, and thus reaffirms our commitment to the open source community."
By Microsoft, March 30, 2009
