Required: Massive email fraud bust. Tired: Cops who did the paperwork. Expired: 281 suspected con men's freedom

US prosecutors say 281 suspected criminal hackers around the world have been arrested as part of a massive takedown operation against so-called business email compromise operations. That's the type of caper in which crooks hijack executives' email accounts, or impersonate the staffers, to trick colleagues into wiring funds to …

[bombastic bob]

a good start

what it says in the title. 281 is a good start.

[Pascal Monett]

That was one massive operation

Kudos to all involved in arresting those miscreants.

On the other hand, 281 criminals working together - who would've thought that many could join forces ?

[Grikath]

Royalty...

Now.. Can we finally figure out how extensive the Nigerian Royal Family actually is?

[WolfFan]

Re: Royalty...

Smaller than the Saudi RF. Allegedly there are enough Saudi princes to man a brigade or two, and that's just the boyz, grrlz don't count in Benighted Deepest Saudia. Come the revolution, the revolutionaries will have to build a lot of walls to stick all of them up against.

Besides, it's a long time since I got an email from a Nigerian Prince. Mostly I get emails from Master Sargent Samuel K. Doe, United States Marine Corps and NOT anyone of a similar name from Liberia, nope, not the boy in Liberia, not at all, who apparently has Saddam Husein's treasure and is still in Iraq and can't bring it back to the US without my help; if I do certain things for him, and pay certain fees, I can get a million of the $26 million in gold that he has. I also get little notes from Director of the FBI Louis B. Freeh, who, it seems, didn't really leave the FBI in 2001 but is still there and still wants to give me my $26 million (hmm. Gee, where have I seen that number before?) if I only pay certain fees.

[Fred Flintstone]

That reminds me..

In this context, you may enjoy this cartoon.

:)

[Anonymous Coward]

I wonder...

If any of the arrested blokes were this guy...

https://domainbigdata.com/gmail.com/mj/JNyNkiTlxRILpO-KucqcgA

He seems to be buying up loads of clone domains...

[Nick Kew]

The punishment

Let's suppose some of these get convicted. What punishment will they face? We can speculate ...

US: several years in a rather harsh regime.

African countries (I may be out of date here): some proper hell-hole, though not necessarily the most secure.

UK: Not violent nor sexual? That'll be a slap on the wrist. Maybe as much as a suspended sentence.

Everywhere: Innocent until proven broke may apply, depending on how rich and well-connected individual defendants are. How many cases will be thrown out when the right palms are greased on a technicality?

[Antron Argaiv]

Re: The punishment

Punishment: Put them in a cell with a receive-only phone which rings at random intervals with robocalls.

Side benefit: A robocall "bit bucket", if you will -- a place to which all robocalls can be diverted!