A network of online fraudsters who masqueraded as European crime-fighting agency Europol and collected millions of euro in fake fines has been broken up – by Europol.
The group, which worked across 30 countries over the past two years, paralysed computers with a virus and left messages purporting to be from organisations such as Europol and the police, saying users could only regain access if they paid a fine.
“It’s impossible to know for sure how many citizens were affected by this, but we estimate hundreds of thousands of Europeans were,” Europol director Rob Wainwright said in Madrid yesterday.
“If we take into account that the average fine was 100 euros and 3 per cent . . . paid it, then the estimated damage is millions of euros,” he said. Wainwright added his own name had been used to trick users. The virus was known as “Ransomware”.
The leader of the fraud network, a 27-year-old Russian citizen, was arrested in December in the United Arab Emirates, Spain’s secretary of state for security, Francisco Martinez, said yesterday. Spanish police arrested 10 members of the group last week on the Costa del Sol.
