Live data from Hacker News

Euro cops take down cybercrime network with 49M fake accounts

itnews.com.au

21–30 of 100 posts

Re: Euro cops take down cybercrime network with 49M fake accounts

#21
post #12
post #2

I don't think this comment will contribute much, so please forgive that, but calling a "Collaboration between Europol and the Shadowserver Foundation" for "Euro cops" is probably the most Australian thing I've ever seen on the entire internet. https://www.europol.europa.eu/media-press/newsroom/news/cybe...

I enjoyed the title more that I want to admit TBH :) In every country in Europe people are pissed with their government and hate the police but when its a "Euro" thing it feels much better. The online narrative may make you think that "Europe" is a dirty word(chat control, cookie banner, regulations, fines etc), but its actually much more pure than any local politics and much much less divisive. The "Euro cops" phras…

The EU has its advantages, but I'd never list "more pure" and "not corrupt" among them. The EU introduced lobbying (=legal corruption) into European politics when most countries historically didn't have much of it. It also has a massive amount of normal, God-fearing illegal corruption.

Many of the biggest stories about the EU are about or have a sizable aspect of corruption. Chat Control amd Thorn, Ursula von der Leyen and Big Pharma, Ursula von der Leyen and $anything.

Follow the Money is a thriving investigative journalism publication that lives off uncovering corruption in the EU.

https://netzpolitik.org/2022/dude-wheres-my-privacy-how-a-ho...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pfizergate

https://www.ftm.eu/

Re: Euro cops take down cybercrime network with 49M fake accounts

#22
post #12
post #2

I don't think this comment will contribute much, so please forgive that, but calling a "Collaboration between Europol and the Shadowserver Foundation" for "Euro cops" is probably the most Australian thing I've ever seen on the entire internet. https://www.europol.europa.eu/media-press/newsroom/news/cybe...

I enjoyed the title more that I want to admit TBH :) In every country in Europe people are pissed with their government and hate the police but when its a "Euro" thing it feels much better. The online narrative may make you think that "Europe" is a dirty word(chat control, cookie banner, regulations, fines etc), but its actually much more pure than any local politics and much much less divisive. The "Euro cops" phras…

This reminded me of something Jean-Claude Juncker once said about democracy in the EU:

> We all know what to do, but we don't know how to get re-elected once we have done it.

Being a step removed from local politics means they can do stuff without the immediate fear they're all kicked out, but the other downside of people not really caring who they elect is it's relatively easy to be elected on a "We hate the EU" line. It's a weird place.

Re: Euro cops take down cybercrime network with 49M fake accounts

#23

> The coordinated takedown, codenamed Operation SIMCARTEL, took place on October 10 in Latvia, as part of a joint investigation by police in the Baltic nation, Austria, Estonia and Finland. Not the best way to see my country in the news, but oh well. That said, I wish I could reasonably do something similar to what's possible with e-mails: where you can have one mailbox per account/company you want to do interaction…

Honest question, how well does it go for for email ? I did that pretty seriously for a while, and in my case I feel it led to nothing specific. I'd get spam from weird places and shut the address, but that would actually amount to an extremely small amount of the total spam I was getting. Also my ISP or the phone company was selling away my email and there was no way I'd just block them, nor would they give a shit ab…

I personally like the idea that my bank account has a completely different email and password then any other account.

In theory, criminals don't know where to even try to exploit/phish.

Re: Euro cops take down cybercrime network with 49M fake accounts

#24
post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I enjoyed the title more that I want to admit TBH :) In every country in Europe people are pissed with their government and hate the police but when its a "Euro" thing it feels much better. The online narrative may make you think that "Europe" is a dirty word(chat control, cookie banner, regulations, fines etc), but its actually much more pure than any local politics and much much less divisive. The "Euro cops" phras…

The EU has its advantages, but I'd never list "more pure" and "not corrupt" among them. The EU introduced lobbying (=legal corruption) into European politics when most countries historically didn't have much of it. It also has a massive amount of normal, God-fearing illegal corruption. Many of the biggest stories about the EU are about or have a sizable aspect of corruption. Chat Control amd Thorn, Ursula von der Ley…

On the contrary, EU is notoriously hard for the rich to lobby. It is also the primary motivation behind the super rich to be against EU since they too are having trouble to find someone in EU to solve their "problems". A famous anecdote is from Rupert Murdock who is able to influence UK poltics at whim but had no effect on EU: https://www.quora.com/When-I-go-into-Downing-Street-they-do-...

He was also a huge backer of Brexit.

On social media there's persistent and years long push to paint EU as anti-Business. They are pushing and pushing for de-regulations.

The Pfizergate is another great example of what happens when you have a centralized decision. That scandal only exist because of the Covid, an unprecedented situation where EU has to take quick actions and had to engage with companies directly. The scope of the scandal is also extremely benign compared to what you have in other places, it's essentially a transparency scandal. No one is even seriously accusing her of abuse of her position for personal enrichment when in a normal country this type of scandal is often about giving the contract to a relative of theirs or an election campaign donor.

Once the Ukraine war is over, I also expect to see other scandals to be unearthed as they were rushed to acquire weapons fast.

There are scandals like Qatar paying an MPs to push their agenda, but other than that EU is so much less corrupt than anything the local governments have. Those involved in the Qatar scandal went to prison, how many local politicians you have who go to prison for anything other than political reasons?

Have you noticed what has been happening in US since February for example? That one is extreme but all over EU the local governments have some sort of these scams and dealings. In countries like US all you have to do is to buy president's crypto coins or make a donation for his election campaigns. In EU, you simply can't do anything of this sort. That's why those who want influence actually pay social media influencers to push an agenda and this is considerably more expensive and hard compared to just establishing a relationship and paying up the president.

Many of EU's weaknesses are also it's strength since having full control and being able to move fast comes with its risks.

That's why across the EU the trust in EU and support for EU is way higher than any local governments. The worst is over %50 in favor of EU, when most of the governments consider themselves lucky if they are in the %30s.

Re: Euro cops take down cybercrime network with 49M fake accounts

#26
post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Honest question, how well does it go for for email ? I did that pretty seriously for a while, and in my case I feel it led to nothing specific. I'd get spam from weird places and shut the address, but that would actually amount to an extremely small amount of the total spam I was getting. Also my ISP or the phone company was selling away my email and there was no way I'd just block them, nor would they give a shit ab…

I personally like the idea that my bank account has a completely different email and password then any other account. In theory, criminals don't know where to even try to exploit/phish.

Yes. BTW I still do that, but with a single address, username+myonlinebank@domain.com style. It was easier when I need to give them my email again on the phone or in other circumstances, they can see it's just the same with extra bits.

Re: Euro cops take down cybercrime network with 49M fake accounts

#27
post #12
post #2

I don't think this comment will contribute much, so please forgive that, but calling a "Collaboration between Europol and the Shadowserver Foundation" for "Euro cops" is probably the most Australian thing I've ever seen on the entire internet. https://www.europol.europa.eu/media-press/newsroom/news/cybe...

I enjoyed the title more that I want to admit TBH :) In every country in Europe people are pissed with their government and hate the police but when its a "Euro" thing it feels much better. The online narrative may make you think that "Europe" is a dirty word(chat control, cookie banner, regulations, fines etc), but its actually much more pure than any local politics and much much less divisive. The "Euro cops" phras…

> In every country in Europe people are pissed with their government and hate the police

Objectively false [1]. Europe is pissed at government (~30% approval) and love the police (70% approval). Hating on police is an US thing exclusively.

1: https://opendata.cbs.nl/#/CBS/nl/dataset/80518ned/table

Re: Euro cops take down cybercrime network with 49M fake accounts

#28
post #27
post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I enjoyed the title more that I want to admit TBH :) In every country in Europe people are pissed with their government and hate the police but when its a "Euro" thing it feels much better. The online narrative may make you think that "Europe" is a dirty word(chat control, cookie banner, regulations, fines etc), but its actually much more pure than any local politics and much much less divisive. The "Euro cops" phras…

> In every country in Europe people are pissed with their government and hate the police Objectively false [1]. Europe is pissed at government (~30% approval) and love the police (70% approval). Hating on police is an US thing exclusively. 1: https://opendata.cbs.nl/#/CBS/nl/dataset/80518ned/table

Okay, I may be exaggerating a bit the European's attitudes towards their local police and governments(some small and cold countries tend to trust their local police and government more than the larger countries at sunny places) but here you can see that EU is consistency viewed more favorably than the local ones through the years:

https://europa.eu/eurobarometer/surveys/detail/3372

Re: Euro cops take down cybercrime network with 49M fake accounts

#29
post #25

> In the raid, authorities seized 1200 SIM boxes, with the devices containing 40,000 active SIM cards Realistically, wouldn't that look suspicious to a cell tower if 40k sims log in from one location?

Considering how enriched we are with mobile devices you'd probably already have hundred of thousands logging in from one location.

Re: Euro cops take down cybercrime network with 49M fake accounts

#30
post #25

> In the raid, authorities seized 1200 SIM boxes, with the devices containing 40,000 active SIM cards Realistically, wouldn't that look suspicious to a cell tower if 40k sims log in from one location?

If they mostly received inbound traffic, the carrier actually gets paid for it, so may not have any incentive to stop this. Carriers generally only care when SIM farms place outgoing traffic (it allows them to use cheap/free consumer plans instead of expensive SMS providers).
Post reply on HN