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From the Los Angeles Times

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Secret Service joins probe into Sierra Madre credit card fraud

Losses top $82,000 as detectives identify at least 282 victims defrauded at a now closed gas station in Sierra Madre. Police are looking for the owner and a man who allegedly used a cloned credit card at a Montebello bank.

By Richard Winton, Los Angeles Times

January 8, 2011

Detectives have identified at least 282 victims of credit card fraud at a Sierra Madre gas station and are working to find the business' owner and a man photographed allegedly using a cloned card at a Montebello bank.

With losses now topping $82,000 and the investigation extending to a second gas station in the city, Sierra Madre Mayor Joe Mosca said the U.S. Secret Service, which specializes in card fraud scams, is joining the probe.

"The nature of this crime and the number of people it has affected is highly unusual in Sierra Madre," Mosca said.

Police said 75% of the victims are residents of the foothill community who used credit or debit cards since July at EVG Quality Gas, 50 S. Baldwin Ave.

Investigators are seeking to question station owner Evgeny K. Yakimenko, who has not been seen since the station closed shortly after Christmas, said Sierra Madre Police Chief Marilyn Diaz.

"He is a person of interest," she said.

Diaz said little is known about Yakimenko, who acquired the station early last year from a man who owns another gas station in the community. Police also are looking for two other people connected to the station.

Diaz said the credit and debit cards were skimmed using an electronic device that snags account information. In some cases, the victim's card information was used to charge purchases; in other instances, cloned cards were created to make retail purchases elsewhere or withdraw money from bank accounts.

"The cards were used in the days after Christmas when people aren't paying as much attention to their bills," Diaz said.

The first identity theft case was reported to police Dec. 27. The number of cases has grown steadily since then.

"There were so many people at the police station, it was like an open house," said resident Sue Levoe, 54, whose family credit card was charged for about $180 on Dec. 29, about four weeks after her husband bought gas at the station.

"Everyone in Sierra Madre knows someone who is a victim," Levoe said of the town, which has a population of fewer than 11,000. She said she recalls driving past the station in late December with an out-of-town friend who remarked on how cheap the gas was there.

Police said six of the cases involved six transactions each, and one involved nine transactions. The highest loss from an individual case was $3,782, Diaz said.

Under federal law, a cardholder is not responsible for fraudulent losses beyond $50 per card and not liable for any losses if the theft occurs after a problem is reported. But the financial institutions that issued the cards are still losing the money.

Police are looking at whether the fraud extended to a Valero gas station in the city, where a small number of people reported using cards at that station and seeing bills from EVG.

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-gas-station-20110108,0,326465.story?track=rss

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Long Beach gang member arrested in three cold-case murders

A Long Beach gang member newly released from prison in New York has been arrested by Long Beach police in connection with the murders of three people in 2001 and 2002, authorities said Friday.

Juan Pablo Camacho, 33, a Mexican immigrant, was arrested Dec. 29 in Plattsburgh, N.Y., by Long Beach police investigating the three cold-case murders. He was being held in New York, awaiting deportation to Mexico after serving a prison term on weapons and illegal immigration charges.

The hunt for Camacho began Oct. 14, 2001, when Long Beach police found Richard Murillo, 30, shot to death in an alley on Rose Avenue. About 8:45 p.m. that night, Carrie Waltier, 33, was found dead in the 10000 block of Pinehurst Street in South Gate.

Long Beach and L.A. County sheriff's homicide detectives quickly connected the cases and later learned the victims were a couple who had been together in the hours before their killings.

Detectives reconstructed the crime and determined Murillo had been shot and killed in the alley, but Waltier was abducted from Rose Avenue and shot to death in South Gate, where her body was dumped in the street.

The lab notified Long Beach police in October that they had obtained a positive match, which identified Camacho. As detectives sought to find Camacho, they tied him to a third killing on May 19, 2002.

In that incident, Long Beach police officers found Richard Graves, 32, shot to death in the 300 block of East Esther Street. Witnesses reported hearing gunshots moments before officers arrived.

The motives for the murders remained under investigation.

Detectives learned Camacho was in New York and secured arrest warrants to detain him upon his release from prison. He is being held in lieu of $3 million bail in Los Angeles County Jail, awaiting arraignment Jan. 12 on the three murders.

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2011/01/long-beach-gang-member-arrested-in-three-cold-case-murders.html

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FBI Director Robert S. Mueller III in O.C. denies sting operations aimed at terrorists are entrapment

FBI Director Robert S. Mueller III said in Orange County this week that the agency's use of sting operations has helped thwart terror attacks despite criticism that they amount to entrapment.

“We have been tremendously successful in thwarting attacks,” Mueller said Thursday in Orange, where he was unveiling a regional cyber-crime data analysis lab.

The FBI has been accused of cornering suspects believed to be potential terrorists, and critics claim the alleged undercover sting operations are especially focused on the Muslim community.

“There will be critics,” Mueller said. “But the one thing that our critics should know and understand is that we investigate individuals. We don't investigate areas of worship, we do not investigate particular persons. We have predication for undertaking any investigation we undertake.”

Recently, attorneys for Mohamed Osman Mohamud, a 19-year-old Somali American accused of plotting to explode a bomb at a Christmas tree lighting in Portland, Ore., said he was entrapped by the FBI, meaning he was induced into engaging in a crime he otherwise would not have committed.

On Thursday, Mueller dismissed accusations that the bureau was ever guilty of employing entrapment during its investigations.

“There has not been yet to my knowledge a defendant who has been acquitted for asserting the entrapment defense, and that is, in my mind, because we are very careful in these investigations and its substantial oversight that they're absolutely essential if we are to protect the community against terrorist attacks,” he said.

Mueller said that since the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, each FBI field office has worked on outreach to the Muslim community and called relationships across the country “exceptionally good.”

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2011/01/fbi-director-robert-s-mueller-iii-in-oc-denies-sting-operations-aimed-at-terrorists-are-entrapment.html

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From the Washington Examiner

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VA legislation would mean jail time for bullying

Del. Adam Ebbin, D-Arlington/Alexandria, is proposing to elevate extreme cases of bullying to a class-one misdemeanor punishable by a year in prison and up to a $2,500 fine and enable victims to sue their harassers. In conjunction, Del. David Englin, D-Arlington/Fairfax, introduced the Anti-Bullying Responsibility Act that would make bullying prevention a mandatory part of teacher training, require all incidents to be reported to the district superintendent, and force schools to create procedures to separate bullies and their victims.

Englin was moved to include the last measure by a Fairfax County case in which a group of boys repeatedly sent sexually threatening text messages to a female fifth-grade classmate at Sunrise Valley Elementary School in Reston.

"And when she went to school, she was made to sit in the same classrooms as these boys," Englin said. "Because it happened off school grounds, the administrators said there was nothing they could do."

More than half of Fairfax public school students said they had been bullied in the last year in a 2009 survey of eighth-, 10th-, and 12th-graders by the school system and local government.

"Bullying transcends poverty, and it transcends socioeconomics," Englin said. "Even in the best schools, bullying happens."

Ebbin's bill focuses on the punishment side; he said he was aghast to discover there was no state law against bullying after the Yorktown sheriff's office refused to investigate a bullying victim's suicide as a crime.

"The bulliers had said beforehand, 'Why don't you just go ahead and get it over with and kill yourself?' " Ebbin said. "It's troubling that it could happen in this state."

In addition to criminalizing serious acts of bullying -- whose shades of gray individual school systems would define -- Ebbin's bill would require any physical injury resulting from bullying to be reported to the commonwealth's attorney. Both his and Englin's proposals would create unprecedented databases of bullying incidents and trends.

"Are there particular schools where this is a problem? And why is it a problem in some schools, and not others?" Englin said. "There's an anecdotal sense that this is a serious problem and perhaps even a growing problem, but if we're not actually reporting and collecting data, it's hard to know."

http://washingtonexaminer.com/print/local/education/2011/01/va-legislation-would-mean-jail-time-bullying

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Fiery package addressed to Homeland Security chief

First, fiery packages sent to top officials in Maryland were opened, revealing an angry message complaining of the state's terrorism tip line. Then, a mailing addressed to the nation's homeland security chief ignited with a similar flash of fire and smoke at a D.C. postal processing facility.

While authorities have not said if the latest parcel contained a note, they did say the three packages were alike. The targeting of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano also seemed to echo anger expressed by the mailer of the first two.

Napolitano launched a nationwide "see something, say something" campaign in July, and her recorded voice can be heard in Washington-area subway stations, reminding commuters to report suspicious behavior. The program expanded last month to include more than 230 Walmarts across the country.

The Maryland packages had an explicit message, railing against highway signs urging motorists to report suspicious activity by calling a toll-free number. The message read: "Report suspicious activity! Total Bull----! You have created a self fulfilling prophecy."

Authorities fear there could be more packages.

"We've got to make sure we go after this person and get them off the street and get them behind bars, because these kinds of things are very, very dangerous," Maryland State Police Col. Terrence Sheridan said. "We just don't know where this person is going with this. We don't know who it is. We don't know what they're thinking right now."

Officials have declined to speculate on whether the incendiary devices worked as intended or were supposed to cause more harm, but they did not contain explosive material.

One explosives expert said that generally if there's no explosive material, the devices aren't meant to cause much destruction.

"With an incendiary, you have a slower process involved," he said. "It can burst into flames, but unless it's something that's a liquid that's expelled ... you wouldn't have that sort of immediate danger to the person," said Leo W. West, a retired FBI explosives expert in Virginia.

In Maryland, the packages ignited when they were opened, singeing the fingers of two state workers. At the D.C. facility, the package wasn't opened and was discovered when it began popping and smoking. It emitted "a brief flash of fire" before extinguishing itself, D.C. Police Chief Cathy Lanier said. No one was injured.

The D.C. package was addressed to Napolitano, according to a department official who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of an ongoing investigation. The parcel ignited in northeast Washington about 2:45 p.m.

In Maryland, the state's terrorism tip line is widely shown on overhead highway signs along with information about missing children. To the ire of some drivers, the signs added real-time traffic estimates to major highways in March. Some commuters complained drivers slowed to read the signs and backed up traffic. At Gov. Martin O'Malley's request, the state studied the issue and removed the real-time postings from one congested area on the Capital Beltway. There are 113 signs statewide.

The earlier packages, addressed to O'Malley and to Transportation Secretary Beverley Swaim-Staley, have been taken to the FBI lab in Quantico, Va., for forensic analysis, and Lanier said the D.C. package would also be sent there.

The Maryland mailings were opened within a 15-minute period Thursday at buildings 20 miles apart. Mailroom employees around the state were back at work Friday, and they had pictures of the packages and were advised to be vigilant about anything suspicious.

The Postal Service rereleased a safety talk on how to recognize suspicious mail Friday in light of the incidents, American Postal Workers Union spokeswoman Sally Davidow said.

Investigators had no previous indication the packages would be sent anywhere other than Maryland government buildings, FBI spokesman Richard J. Wolf said.

Police have not yet identified any suspects and were searching for disgruntled people who've made threats against state government. Anyone arrested would be charged with possession and use of an incendiary device, which includes a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison, authorities said.

The state terrorism tip line averages about two calls per day, said Jim Newton, privacy officer at the Maryland Coordination and Analysis Center, where police officers field the calls.

Neither Newton nor police were aware of any repeat, angry callers to the tip line.

The call volume typically doesn't spike when the phone number is displayed on highway signs, he said. Instead, calls tend to come in after terrorism cases make news.

Postal inspectors said they had a variety of ways to determine where a package is mailed from, including postmarks and cancellation stamps, which can indicate where a piece of mail was processed.

Postal Inspector Frank Schissler said, but the Maryland packages did not have individual tracking numbers because they were sent by first-class mail, not registered mail or express mail.

In 2001, as the nation was still reeling from the 9/11 attacks, letters containing anthrax were sent to lawmakers and news organizations. The anthrax spores killed five people and sickened 17.

Dangerous devices sent through the mail remain extremely rare, inspectors said, with 13 such cases reported since 2005.

http://washingtonexaminer.com/news/nation/2011/01/fiery-package-addressed-homeland-security-chief

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From the White House

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A National Program Office for Enhancing Online Trust and Privacy

Today, at Stanford University, Commerce Secretary Gary Locke and I were pleased to announce that the Commerce Department will host a National Program Office (NPO) in support of the National Strategy for Trusted Identities in Cyberspace (NSTIC).  As I've written previously, the NSTIC fulfills one of the action items in the Cyberspace Policy Review (pdf) and is a key building block in our efforts to secure cyberspace. 

This holiday season, consumers spent a record $30.81 billion in online retail spending, an increase of 13 percent over the same period the previous year.  This striking growth outshines even the notable 3.3-5.5 percent overall increase in holiday spending this past year.  While clearly a positive sign for our economy, losses from online fraud and identity theft eat away at these gains, not to mention the harm that identity crime causes directly to millions of victims.  We have a major problem in cyberspace, because when we are online we do not really know if people, businesses, and organizations are who they say they are. Moreover, we now have to remember dozens of user names and passwords. This multiplicity is so inconvenient that most people re-use their passwords for different accounts, which gives the criminal who compromises their password the “keys to the kingdom.”

We need a cyber world that enables people to validate their identities securely, but with minimal disclosure of information when they're doing sensitive transactions (like banking) - and lets them stay anonymous when they're not (like blogging). We need a vibrant marketplace that provides people with choices among multiple accredited identity providers – both private and public – and choices among multiple credentials. For example, imagine that a student could get a digital credential from her cell phone provider and another one from her university and use either of them to log-in to her bank, her e-mail, her social networking site, and so on, all without having to remember dozens of passwords. Such a marketplace will ensure that no single credential or centralized database can emerge. In this world, we can cut losses from fraud and identity theft, as well as cut costs for businesses and government by reducing inefficient identification procedures. We can put in-person services online without security trade-offs, thereby providing greater convenience for everyone.  

This is the world envisioned in the NSTIC.  We call it the Identity Ecosystem.  We will be working to finalize the NSTIC in the coming months, but that is only the beginning of the process. I'm excited to be working with Secretary Locke. The Commerce Department is perfectly suited to work with the private sector to implement the NSTIC. In addition, there are other departments and agencies with strategic roles to play as well. Above all though, we look to the leadership of the private sector. Therein lies the key to success. Now is the time to move forward with our shared vision of a better, more secure cyberspace.

In a future post, I will discuss why the NSTIC is different from past efforts to improve online authentication.

Howard A. Schmidt is the Cybersecurity Coordinator and Special Assistant to the President

http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2011/01/07/national-program-office-enhancing-online-trust-and-privacy

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