The FBI has a convenient online Cyber Crime form for victims and/or the 3rd party to the complaint that is an easy-to-use reporting mechanism. A partnership has been formed with the FBI’s Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3 formerly known as the Internet Fraud Complaint Center IFCC) and the National White Collar Crime Center (NW3C) for the combined objective of identifying and bringing to justice those responsible for online internet fraud.

The FBI-IC3’s stated Mission regarding Cyber Crime is “to serve as a vehicle to receive, develop, and refer criminal complaints regarding the rapidly expanding arena of cyber crime.” The IC3 provides the victims of cyber crime with an online reporting form that will be used to alert authorities of suspected criminal or civil violations. IC3 also provides their law enforcement partners and regulatory agencies at the federal, state, local and international level the internet related crime with information gathered through complaint forms to this centralized referral system.

In addition to partnering with law enforcement and regulatory agencies, it will remain a priority objective of the IC3 to establish effective alliances with industry. These alliances will enable the IC3 to leverage both the intelligence and subject matter required in identifying and crafting an aggressive, proactive approach to combating cyber crime.

IC3 accepts online Internet crime complaints from either the person who believes they were defrauded or from a third party to the complainant can best be processed if accurate and complete information accompanies the complaint. Provide the following listed items and any additional information when filing a complaint at website: http://www.ic3.gov/complaint

· Your name

· Your mailing address

· Your telephone number

· The name, address, telephone number, and Web address, if available, of the individual or organization you believe defrauded you.

· Specific details on how, why, and when you believe you were defrauded.

Betty Jo Sheley, http://www.showlinehomesecurity.com Owner Security Products website for Home and Personal Protection. Author participated in Mayoral Conflict Resolution Institute, Community Think Tank Studies. Advise Author of article reprint including my link.

“The subprime loan debacle will make it more difficult for borrowers to get mortgages and will cause U.S. home prices to fall this year for the first time on record”, the National Association of Realtors said.

“The 2007 median price for an existing home likely will decline 0.7 percent to $220,300, the first drop since the real estate trade group began keeping records in 1968 and probably the first decline since the Great Depression,” said Lawrence Yun, an economist with the Chicago-based association

With a few dozen of the big name lenders, New Century for example, either filing for bankruptcy or are in dire financial trouble… it seems as though the US Government is currently not willing to accept that this situation is a problem.

“Despite those warning signals the leadership of the Federal Reserve seemed to encourage the development and use of ARMs that, today, are defaulting and going into foreclosure at record rates,” said Chris Dodd, chairman of the Senate Banking committee.

As we saw with the Enron fiasco, it would seem that we should we be expecting to see a similar nightmare in the mortgage lending arena. The difference here is that people are not loosing their 401ks…instead, they are loosing their homes. As a result, federal regulators and legislators are trying to figure out how to help subprime mortgage borrowers who are facing foreclosure. In an effort to help homeowners, various State authorities also have opened fraud investigations against brokers and lenders for allegedly misleading home buyers about the terms and conditions of their loans. This fallout could potentially reshape the mortgage industry.

As more loans are defaulted on and as more lenders file for bankruptcy, there are various types of data may be considered as critical evidence in litigation. These types of data include:

• e-mail
• plain text and documents
• calendar files
• databases
• spreadsheets
• digital faxes
• audio files
• websites

For litigators, this information can help them prove any misleading, potential criminal, or fraudulent business practices by a subprime loan lender. Once an E-Discovery data audit process has started, and a computer forensics or data recovery service implemented, there are the several tasks to complete which provide the electronic evidence in a format which the client and lawyers will accept.

Jason Perry

For more information on ADR Data Recovery’s Computer Forensics service, visit http://www.computerforensicsassociates.com

You file a UDRP complaint under ICANN and a panel has ordered a transfer of the stolen domain name. From this point, you would think everything would automatically fall into place, but more often than not, you will still have some work to do.

Under the domain name dispute policy, more specifically UDRP Policy Paragraph 4(K), it states that the registrar is required to implement the Panel’s decision 10 (ten) business days after it receives notification of the decision from the dispute resolution service provider, except if the registrar receives information from the domain name registrant (Respondent) in that 10-day period that it is challenging.

Here are some steps cybersquatting lawyers use to ensure that the stolen domain name is transferred back to you:

• Establish an account for the domain name
• Ensure the registrar updates the domain name servers (DNS)
• Ensure the registrar provides you with an Authorization Code so that you can initiate the transfer of the registrar and modify the contact information
• Initiate a request for the transfer of registrar using the Authorization Code
• Note: most registrars have an automated process that requires confirmation from the Admin-C contact on the account.
• Ensure the registrar updates the WHOIS database for the domain name to include your information for the Admin/Technical/Billing contact.

If you become a victim of domain name theft, winning your cybersquatting arbitration is key. Still, the domain name transfer process doesn’t always go as smoothly as it should and may require experienced cybersquatting lawyers to get the domain name back for you. This involves working with your IT person and the registrar, both new and old, to ensure the cybersquatting Panel’s decision is implemented.

Enrico Schaefer is the founding attorney of Traverse Legal, PLC, a law firm specializing in web law. You can find out more about protecting your domain name, UDRP arbitrations and anti-cybersquatting laws at Traverse Legal’s domain name theft and trademark infringement domain dispute blog.

Are you losing visitors to your domain? Are your search engine rankings still yours?

Other people might hijack your search engine rankings and they might steal your web site visitors. The worst thing is that you might not even notice it.

Imagine your domain URL is listed in search engine results on Google, MSN and Yahoo. In the search engine results, most people that click on your domain URL are sent to your website. However, some people that click your domain URL are sent to a totally unrelated website that has nothing to do with your site and although your website domain name URL is displayed in the browser, people see a completely different site that has literally nothing to do with you or your company.

How do these hackers steal your Visitors?

Hackers exploit a flaw in the software some domain name servers use and by sending incorrect information to these particular domain name servers, hackers compromise the domain name server to redirect the traffic for the URLs to another site.

If domain name servers do not use a method to validate that the information has come from valid or authoritative source, it will send visitors to the wrong pages. This means that people who enter your domain name URL in the web browser will be sent to the hacker’s pages instead of your pages.

How can you protect you website?

It is extremely important that you use a reliable host that does not use an open DNS server. To check this, go to www.dnsreport.com and enter the domain name URL of your website. You should see PASS in the Open DNS servers line. If your domain name fails the test, you should contact your web host. If you don’t want to expose your website to hackers, it is critical that you use a secure DNS server. If your web host cannot fix the issue, you should change to another web host.

Enrico Schaefer is the founding attorney of Traverse Legal, PLC, a law firm specializing in web law. You can find out more about protecting your domain name, UDRP arbitrations and anti-cybersquatting laws at Traverse Legal’s domain name theft and trademark infringement domain dispute blog.

You may have noticed some unusual behavior from your significant other such as spending a lot of time ‘at work’ or perhaps more time than normal ‘out with friends’. These are the obvious signals that something could be going on. However, the more subtle indicators that you are being lied to are conveniently hidden from your view.

Maybe your spouse is spending a lot of time on the Internet late at night chatting, web surfing, instant messaging (IMs), sharing files or e-mailing people. The usual attention you are used to receiving from your lover is now not there and you fear the (s)he is up to something. You may have said something or voiced your concerns about ‘why are you looking at porn on the Internet?’ or ‘who are you chatting with online?’ to your significant other only to be told that nothing is going on and there is nothing at all to worry about.

In situations such as this, computer forensics can help discover what exactly is going on. Computer Forensic Investigators can uncover the truth by examining the computer’s hard drive and see what websites, e-mails, chat logs and other pieces of useful information to help you. Once the information is collected and you have had time to go over the data, you will then have the evidence you need to either believe that your relationship is still solid and there isn’t any lying and cheating occurring. Or, that there is and now you will need to evaluate your options and possibly file for a divorce.

The types of information that can be collected by a Computer Forensics Investigator include:

• e-mail
• plain text and documents
• images
• calendar files
• databases
• spreadsheets
• digital faxes
• audio files
• animation
• websites

If you are in a situation where you feel that your partner or spouse is lying and cheating on you, it is up to you to take action. A computer forensics investigation can help you take those steps to collect the evidence you may need to protect yourself and your family.

Jason Perry

Computer Forensics Associates is available to evaluate the damage and potentially recover your lost data. For more information on Computer Forensics Associates service, visit http://www.computerforensicsassociates.com

Most companies will now be required to retain and produce a wider range of electronic data because of the new Federal Rules of Civil Procedure which were approved on December 1, 2006. The types of electronically stored information that companies could be required to produce in a lawsuit range from docs, e-mails, voice mails, text messages and just about any digital information saved on a company’s server, e-mail database or employee’s desktop.

IT departments, as well as corporate counsel, are not very well prepared for these changes. A recent study by Deloitte Financial Advisory Services in November 2006 found that nearly 70% of the respondents said they would require more training on their own corporate record retention policies and procedures. The respondents included CFOs, tax directors, finance directors, controllers and corporate counsel.

One way to reduce a company’s risk is to implement an IT audit system. Employees tend to install additional programs to their computers often without the IT department’s knowledge or approval. Instant messanger (IM) programs for example are readily available and most employees use these types of quick applications to chat with other employees as well as individuals outside of work. IMs are considered ‘faster’ than e-mail, but nonetheless is data being sent to and from somebody.

These ‘text’ messages are where companies can get in trouble. While most e-mail servers have traceable logs and backups, most employee desktop computers are not managed by the IT department and can have those features disabled. It is entirely possible for an employee (or employees) to have a lengthy conversation via text messages totally bypassing the company’s e-mail server where text messages are expected to occur.

Voice mails and Flash drives are also quick methods to share information. Faxes can be sent to voice mail boxes and flash drives are a quick way to share files between computers not connected via a network.

It is these types of situations that a company can find itself in trouble when it comes to litigation. Companies should evaluate their network to find other such areas that may need attention and discuss their options on saving the data.

Jason Perry

Computer Forensics Associates is available to evaluate your situation. For more information on Computer Forensics Associates service, visit http://www.computerforensicsassociates.com

Backup tapes are important. Aside from the fact that backup tapes can save a company’s data in the event of a software failure, hard drive failure, or a database corruption… backing up a company’s data on a regular basis should be a part of every IT department’s disaster recovery plan.

As part of that plan, IT departments should test and validate that the backups are in fact backing up data and is able to be restored. Most companies assume that once the backup is running everything will be safe. However, not many IT departments routinely check the error logs to discover problems. And only when a disaster occurs do they realized that the scheduled backups have not been collecting all of the data.

From an IT point of view, the above is one of the hurdles they deal with on a daily basis. From a legal point of view, those backup tapes are even more valuable. Those tapes represent a snapshot in time for that company.

In a recent case, AAB Joint Venture v. United States, 2007 WL 646157 (Fed. Cl. Feb. 28, 2007), the court heard an argument regarding the a period of time (data) for which that data was not available. The defendant claimed that it had provided all e-mails related to the case. However, the court was not persuaded by defendant’s arguments, and agreed that defendant’s overall production of emails had been far from adequate. The court also said that, while cost was an issue for the court to consider in addressing a motion to compel, it was not the only consideration. The court continued with the following statement:

Here, because the Court finds that defendant had a duty to preserve evidence, as set forth below, the Court cannot relieve Defendant of its duty to produce those documents merely because Defendant has chosen a means to preserve the evidence which makes ultimate production of relevant documents expensive. Accordingly, the Court concludes that Defendant has not adequately responded to Plaintiff’s requests for production of electronic documents and that supplementation of its response to Plaintiff’s requests is necessary.

As the field of Computer Forensics and E-Discovery becomes more mainstream in litigation, more companies may find they need to take a look at what exactly is in the disaster recovery plan for both data loss and litigation.

Jason Perry

Computer Forensics Associates is available to evaluate your situation. For more information on Computer Forensics Associates service, visit http://www.computerforensicsassociates.com

On January 25, 2007 the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit granted a habeas corpus petition relying, in part, upon calculations performed by popular driving direction website Mapquest to determine that the petitioner’s trial counsel had not properly explored petitioner’s alibi before or during his trial on charges of murder and attempted murder. Raygoza v. Hulick, ___ F.3d ___, 2007 WL 184635 (7th Cir. 2007). The Court used Mapquest to determine the distance and travel time between the crime scene and a party petitioner had attended near the time of the crime.

It’s not the first time that Mapquest has been cited as authority in a case. A number of state and federal courts have relied upon Mapquest to determine the distance or travel time between two points. Mapquest has been cited in dozens of reported decisions, including rulings on:

• motions to change venue in civil cases, where the convenience of the forum to parties and potential witnesses was an issue. Smith v. State Farm Mut. Auto. Ins. Co., 169 Md. App. 286, 292, 900 A.2d 301, 305 (2006); Hoskin v. Un. Pacific Railroad Co., 365 Ill. App.3d 1021, 1025, 851 N.E.2d 646, 650 (2006)

• motions to transfer a federal criminal case to another district. United States v. Anderson, 2000 WL 34237505, *7 (W.D. Wis. 2000); United States v. Ferguson, 432 F.Supp.2d 559, 563 n. 5 (E.D. Va. 2006)
• a motion to dismiss, in which the court took judicial notice of the driving distance calculated by Mapquest. Untracht v. Fikri, 454 F.Supp.2d 289, 302 (W.D. Pa. 2006) (citing Gordon v. Lewistown, 272 F.Supp.2d 393, 429 n. 34 (M.D. Pa. 2003))

However, at least one court has held that courts should not take judicial notice of Mapquest results because the website is not sufficiently accurate. Commonwealth v. Brown, 839 A.2d 433, 436-37 (Pa. Super. 2003) (”An internet site determining distances does not have the same inherent accuracy as do professionally accepted medical dictionaries, or encyclopedias, or other matters of common knowledge within the community. The, we hold that the trial court abused its discretion in taking judicial notice of a MapQuest distance determination . . . .”)

Though trial counsel may not be able to count on Mapquest to produce admissible evidence where a timely objection is raised, unchallenged Mapquest results are routinely considered by courts in determining distance or travel time between two points.

Jonathan D. Frieden is a principal of Odin, Feldman & Pittleman, P.C., a law firm in the Washington, D.C. metropolitan area. His practice includes the litigation of intellectual property matters and other complex commercial disputes and the counseling of e-commerce businesses in a variety of industries. He is admitted to practice law in the Commonwealth of Virginia and runs the E-Commerce Law blog, a regularly updated discussion of news, trends, and legal issues affecting e-commerce businesses.

The CAN SPAM Act of 2003 is an acronym for Controlling the Assault of Non-Solicited Pornography and Marketing Act which became effective January 1, 2004. The said legislation sets the requirements for commercial emails and as well the penalties for the violators.

CAN SPAM Act of 2003 permits unsolicited mailing as long as the sender practices the agreed upon requirements for commercial emails. These agreed upon requirements include clarity that the message is an advertisement, accurate header information on which the email and IP addresses of the sender can be tracked. CAN SPAM Act also requires an explicit way for opting out and stop further mailings. Whenever an email contains adult content, the sender should place a message prompt or the like in the subject line to warn the reader. A misleading subject line is discouraged.

Furthermore, commercial emails sent to addresses compiled without permission, such as by automation and email address generation using ‘dictionary attack’ (combination of names, letters and numbers into multiple permutations) are prohibited. In addition, aggravated offense such as hijacking computers through Trojan or worms or using open mail relays for sending spam is also prohibited.

The content is exempted if it is purely religious, or if the content complies with the marketing mechanism specified by the law. Messages with national security content are also exempted.

To understand more about the CAN SPAM Act of 2003 – the governing bodies, the penalties, reactions and detail explanation about it, you can visit http://www.ftc.gov/bcp/conline/pubs/buspubs/canspam.htm.

Despite the measures established to fight spam, including CAN SPAM Act, most online marketers who send legitimate emails and are CAN SPAM compliant get block and thus experience low ROI.

To further increase your understanding about email marketing and other considerations (other than those stated in the CAN SPAM Act) kindly check http://www.emailreach.com.

New Federal Rules of Civil Procedure became law on December 1st, 2006, which most corporate lawyers and attorneys are either unfamiliar with or have not been required to use.

There are three rules specifically that impact Computer Forensics and E-Discovery which need to be considered when building a case for your client, as well as protecting your client’s rights. The Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, Rule 26, Rule 34, and Rule 45, have been updated in accordance with Computer Forensics and Electronic Evidence Discovery and have added many new procedures for handling and requesting electronic information.

Electronic Discovery (or E-Discovery) refers to any process in which electronic data is sought, located, secured, and searched with the intent of using it as evidence in a civil or criminal legal case. Electronic Discovery can be carried out off-line on a particular computer or it can be done across a network.

There are several phases to Electronic Discovery. The collection of data is just the beginning of the process. Once a data audit has been completed and a computer forensics or data recovery service implemented, then there are the tasks to process the electronic evidence and produce the electronic evidence in a format which the client and lawyers will accept, such as TIFFs or PDFs.

Various types of data may be considered as critical evidence in a case. These types of data include:

• e-mail
• plain text and documents
• images
• calendar files
• databases
• spreadsheets
• digital faxes
• audio files
• animation
• websites
• computer applications
• viruses and spyware

Knowing ahead of time what requirements affect your company with regards to E-Discovery and preparing for them will not only help your case, but protect your business.

Jason Perry

Computer Forensics Associates is available to evaluate your situation and needs. For more information on Computer Forensics Associates Computer Forensics and E-Discovery service, visit http://www.computerforensicsassociates.com