A conversation with an iTunes card scammer
Intro
On a mailing list I am part of, a user had their email account hacked, and the scammer used the iTunes gift card scam. This is a quick article about the scam and how to avoid being a victim.
The scam
In the world of information security, there are many cutting edge attacks. Like the one out of Israel recently, researchers from Ben-Gurion University and the Weizmann Institute revealed a new technique for long-distance eavesdropping they call lamphone.
The lamphone attack allows anyone with a laptop, telescope and a $400 electro-optical sensor, to listen in on any sounds in a room that’s hundreds of feet away in real-time, by merely observing the minuscule vibrations those sounds create on the glass surface of a light bulb inside.
By measuring the tiny changes in light output from the bulb that those vibrations cause, the researchers showed that a spy can pick up sound clearly enough to discern the contents of conversations or even recognize a piece of music. This is straight out of Tom Clancy.
On the opposite end are the low-tech attacks such as iTunes gift card scams. Recently, someone’s email accounts were hacked and the attacker posted on their behalf on a community mailing list I am part of. The scammer asked people to buy…
