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☆ Criminals are looting millions from ATMs in Europe. Here’s why Germany is a prime target
▼ + stars: | 2024-10-27 | by ( Sophie Tanno | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +8 min

Rather than staging dramatic and risky bank robberies, criminal groups in Europe have been targeting ATMs as an easier and more low-key target. An explosive device used to blow up ATMs shown at a press event in Stuttgart, Germany on November 21, 2023. The majority of Germany’s 83.3 million citizens have to travel no further than one kilometer to reach their nearest ATM, according to the central bank, Bundesbank. Bodo Marks/picture alliance/Getty Images/FileA 2023 BKA report notes that ATM robberies in Germany have been rising since 2005, although they dropped slightly from 2022 to 2023. In July, the German government announced that ATM robberies would receive harsher punishment.

Persons: Europol, Bernd Weißbrod, ” Europol, Baden Württemberg, ” Bundesbank’s Johannes Beermann, –, Bodo Marks, ’, Nancy Faeser, ” Organizations: CNN, Federal Criminal Police, Germany –, Getty, German Banking Industry Committee, “ Locations: Kronberg, BKA, Europe, Germany, France, Netherlands, Stuttgart, Wiernsheim, German, Baden, Bundesbank, Sparkasse, Schenefeld, –, “ Germany

☆ Italian Camorra mafia fugitive arrested in Colombia for drug trafficking
▼ + stars: | 2024-10-25 | by ( Https | Media-Cldnry.S-Nbcnews.Com Image Upload Newscms | ) www.nbcnews.com time to read: +1 min

A fugitive member of the Camorra mafia due to serve almost 19 years in prison for drug trafficking has been arrested in Colombia, Italian police said on Friday. In announcing his arrest, police distributed a picture of Belvedere posing by the grave of the notorious late Colombian drug lord Pablo Escobar. Luigi Belvedere, a fugitive member of the Italian Camorra mafia, in an undated photo. The Camorra, based in Naples and surrounding areas, is one of Italy’s main mafia groups. It is made up of a myriad of family-based clans, unlike the more pyramidal structure of the Sicilian mafia, and its main businesses are drug trafficking, counterfeiting and money laundering.

Persons: Luigi Belvedere, Belvedere, Pablo Escobar, Stato Organizations: Camorra, Italian Camorra mafia, EUROPOL Locations: Colombia, Medellin, Colombian, Naples

☆ ChatGPT can be tricked into telling people how to commit crimes, a tech firm finds
▼ + stars: | 2024-10-23 | by ( Anna Cooban | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +4 min

London CNN —ChatGPT can be duped into providing detailed advice on how to commit crimes ranging from money laundering to the export of weapons to sanctioned countries, a tech startup found, raising questions over the chatbot’s safeguards against its use to aid illegal activity. Norwegian firm Strise ran experiments asking ChatGPT for tips on committing specific crimes. And in another experiment, run earlier this month, ChatGPT produced lists of methods to help businesses evade sanctions, such as those against Russia, including bans on certain cross-border payments and the sale of arms. Strise sells software that helps banks and other companies combat money laundering, identify sanctioned individuals and tackle other risks. “It’s like having a corrupt financial adviser on your desktop,” Rødevand said on the company’s podcast last month, describing the money laundering experiment.

Persons: London CNN —, Strise, ChatGPT, Handelsbanken, Marit Rødevand, Strise’s, ”, OpenAI, “, Rødevand, “ We’re, Europol, Olesya Dmitracova Organizations: London CNN, Strise, CNN, Russia Locations: Russia, Nordic, Norway

☆ Police in France and Italy bust gang that sold bottles of fake vintage wine for $16,000 apiece
▼ + stars: | 2024-10-16 | by ( Jack Guy | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +3 min

CNN —Six people have been arrested as part of an investigation into a wine fraud ring that allegedly sold fake French wine for up to €15,000 ($16,300) per bottle. Police in Italy searched 14 properties and seized large amounts of wine, wine bottles, counterfeit stickers from top French vineyards and machines used to recap bottles, according to a statement from European law enforcement agency Europol, published Tuesday. “The surge in demand for fine wine in the 21st century… has motivated fraudsters,” George told CNN. “Better training and better knowledge of what bottles of fine wine – and especially old bottles of fine wine – really look like would be useful,” said George. Bolgheri Sassicaia red wine comes from an area on the coast of Tuscany and has become one of Italy’s best-known fine wines since it appeared on the market in the 1970s.

Persons: ” Europol, Europol, Prosecutors, Stuart George, ” George, ” Fraudsters, ”, George, “, Petrus, Finanza Organizations: CNN, Police, Russian, French Gendarmerie, Swiss Federal Police, Arden Fine Wines, Reuters, Guardia Locations: Italy, Italian, Russian, French, Dijon, London, Tuscany, Sicily, Milan, Bulgaria

☆ Australian police infiltrate encrypted messaging app Ghost and arrest dozens
▼ + stars: | 2024-09-18 | by ( Associated Press | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +2 min

CNN —Australian police said Wednesday they have infiltrated Ghost, an encrypted global communications app developed for criminals, leading to dozens of arrests. In an undated photo provided by the Australian Federal Police, illicit drugs are found in a concealed compartment in a vehicle. Australian Federal Police/APPolice allege that Jung developed the app specifically for criminal use in 2017. Australian police technicians were able to modify software updates regularly pushed out by the administrator, McCartney said. The modified smartphones sold for 2,350 Australian dollars ($1,590) which included a six-month subscription to Ghost and tech support.

Persons: Jay Je Yoon Jung, Jung, Ian McCartney, “, ” McCartney, Kirsty Schofield, Col, Florian Manet, McCartney, ’ Organizations: CNN, Australian Federal Police, AP Police, Home Affairs Ministry, Command, Department, Australian, ’ Sydney Locations: Canada, Sweden, Ireland, Italy, Australia

Neumann noted the latest Europol data showed “the number of attacks and planned attacks has more than quadrupled” since 2022. The apparent uptick in the recruitment of young radicals to carry out acts of terror comes as European security officials express worries at a potential resurgence of organized – or “directed” - terror attacks. The group has built a remarkable presence in Turkey over the past three years, according to court documents and analysts. Swiss police in March arrested a 15-year-old Swiss boy and a 16-year-old Italian boy for ISIS support and plotting bomb attacks, according to a police statement. Yulia Morozova/ReutersThe extent of ISIS-K’s use of Turkey as a transit hub is acknowledged by officials in the Turkish indictment.

Persons: Peter Neumann, Neumann, ”, ” Neumann, “, Lise Jaulin, Dilara Senkaya, “ Rustam, Rustam, Yulia Morozova Organizations: CNN, ISIS, Paris Olympics, King’s College London, MIT, Swiss, Analysts, Soviet Union, Turkish, Italian Santa Maria Catholic Church, Foreign Operations, Hall, Foreign Locations: Europe, West, Paris, Islamic, Khorasan, Central Asia, Turkey, Saint, French, France, Haute, Savoie, Dusseldorf, Heidelberg, Montenegro, Austria, Afghanistan, Tajikistan, Moscow, Italian, Istanbul, Swedish, Pakistan, Tajik, Iran, Russia, Crocus, Syria, Iraq

“This outage is historic in scale,” Mikko Hypponen, a research specialist at the software company WithSecure and a cybercrime adviser to Europol, told DealBook. It issued a software update that is causing Microsoft systems, including its Azure cloud service, to crash or not function properly. Long queues of airline passengers could be seen at airports around the world, with some resorting to manual check-in. In France, the television networks TF1 and Canal+ told the public on X that they could not go on the air on Friday morning. The incident points to how reliant the global economy is on a handful of major tech companies to run vital infrastructure.

Persons: ” Mikko Hypponen, Europol, DealBook, George Kurtz, CrowdStrike, ” Organizations: Microsoft, United, Delta, Airlines, Air France, KLM, Japan Airlines, TF1, Sky Locations: Europe, Asia, France

☆ In 'Operation Endgame,' global law enforcement teamed up in their biggest battle against hackers. It's a start.
▼ + stars: | 2024-06-19 | by ( Natalie Musumeci | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +7 min

download the appSign up to get the inside scoop on today’s biggest stories in markets, tech, and business — delivered daily. 'Largest ever operation against botnets'Europol called the sting the "largest ever operation against botnets, which play a major role in the deployment of ransomware." As part of the operation, the law enforcement agencies shut down at least four malware groups or "droppers" known as "IcedID," "Smokeloader," "Pikabot," and "Bumblebee." Mitrano said "Operation Endgame," is a "very important first step, but we have to keep going." AdvertisementThe "biggest problem" in the malware world, according to Holt, is that there is always a different iteration of malware on the horizon.

Persons: —, Adam Wandt, John Jay, botnets, Europol, Christopher Wray, alarmingly, Wandt, Ransomware, Tracy Beth Mitrano, it's, Mitrano, Thomas Holt, cybercrime, Holt, Cybercriminals, Wray, borderless cybercrime Organizations: Service, Business, European Union, FBI, cybercrime, New, John, John Jay College of Criminal, botnets, Cornell University, of Criminal Justice, Michigan State University Locations: Ukraine, Armenia, Europe, cryptocurrency, United States, Holt, ransomware

☆ Rare Editions of Pushkin Are Vanishing From Libraries Around Europe
▼ + stars: | 2024-05-01 | by ( Rachel Donadio | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

In April 2022, soon after Russia invaded Ukraine, two men arrived at the library of the University of Tartu, Estonia’s second-largest city. They told the librarians they were Ukrainians fleeing war and asked to consult 19th-century first editions of works by Alexander Pushkin, Russia’s national poet, and Nikolai Gogol. Police are now investigating what they believe is a vast, coordinated series of thefts of rare 19th-century Russian books — primarily first and early editions of Pushkin — from libraries across Europe. Since 2022, more than 170 books valued at more than $2.6 million, according to Europol, have vanished from the National Library of Latvia in Riga, Vilnius University Library, the State Library of Berlin, the Bavarian State Library in Munich, the National Library of Finland in Helsinki, the National Library of France, university libraries in Paris, Lyon and Geneva, and from the Czech Republic. The University of Warsaw library was hardest hit, with 78 books gone.

Persons: Estonia’s, Alexander Pushkin, Russia’s, Nikolai Gogol, Eager, Krista Aru, “, ”, Pushkin Organizations: University of Tartu, Police, National Library of Latvia, Vilnius University Library, State Library of Berlin, Bavarian State Library, National Library of Finland, National Library of France, The University of Warsaw Locations: Russia, Ukraine, United States, Europe, Riga, Munich, Helsinki, Paris, Lyon, Geneva, Czech Republic

☆ LabHost: Police take down $249-a-month global phishing service used by 2,000 hackers
▼ + stars: | 2024-04-18 | by ( Mark Thompson | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +2 min

Thirty-seven suspects were arrested, and more than 70 locations were searched in the UK and across the world between Sunday and Wednesday, the Metropolitan Police said in a statement. LabHost had obtained 480,000 bank card numbers, 64,000 pin numbers, as well as more than 1 million passwords used for websites and other online services, it said. In a separate statement, Europol said four people linked to the running of LabHost, including the developer of the service, had been arrested. At least 40,000 phishing domains, with about 10,000 users worldwide, had been uncovered by the investigation into LabHost, Europol said. “With a monthly fee averaging $249, LabHost would offer a range of illicit services which were customizable and could be deployed with a few clicks,” it said.

Persons: LabHost, Met, Europol Organizations: London CNN —, Metropolitan Police, European, Europol, US Secret Service, Federal Bureau of Locations: United Kingdom, Australia, Finland, LabHost

☆ Global police agencies take down massive scam website that defrauded thousands of victims
▼ + stars: | 2024-04-18 | by ( Ryan Browne | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +3 min

Seksan Mongkhonkhamsao | Moment | Getty ImagesA huge fraud website used by thousands of criminals to trick people into handing over personal information such as email addresses, passwords and bank details, has been infiltrated by international police. Britain's Metropolitan Police said in a statement Thursday that the website, called LabHost, was used by 2,000 criminals to steal users' personal details. Police have so far identified just under 70,000 individual U.K. victims who entered their details onto a website linked to LabHost. LabHost obtained 480,000 credit card numbers, 64,000 PIN codes, as well as more than 1 million passwords used for websites and other online services, the Metropolitan Police said. The Metropolitan Police said that up to 25,000 victims in the U.K. have been contacted by police to notify them that their data has been compromised.

Persons: LabHost, Dame Lynne Owens, Owens Organizations: Britain's Metropolitan Police, Police, Metropolitan Police, The Metropolitan Police, Metropolitan Police Service, Intel, Microsoft, Shadowserver Foundation, Trend, Cyber Defence Alliance, National Crime Agency, City of London Police

☆ Formed in the Cold War, former members of Germany’s Red Army Faction are now fugitives
▼ + stars: | 2024-03-17 | by ( Sophie Tanno | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +9 min

CNN —German authorities have been tracking down the former members of the Red Army Faction (RAF), a now-defunct Cold War-era militant group, who have been on the run for nearly 30 years. The RAF, he said, emerged in what was then West Berlin, at the “crossroads” of the Cold War. The first, and most prominent period from 1970-1977, saw the group murder public officials and US soldiers and take many hostages. In April 1975, six RAF members seized the West German Embassy in Stockholm in a hostage standoff with the goal of forcing the release of imprisoned RAF members. The Red Army Faction claimed responsibility for the assassination, but the perpetrators were never brought to justice.

Persons: Baader, –, Jürgen Ponto, Siegfried Buback, Daniela Klette, Burkhard Garweg, Ernst, Volker Staub, Klette, Claudia Ivone, Garweg, Staub, pouncing, ”, Ivone, Wolfgang Kraushaar, Kraushaar, Axel, Andreas Baader, Ukrike Meinhof, Meinhof, ” Kraushaar, Helmut Schmidt, Franz Josef Strauss, Axel Springer, Springer, Alfred Herrhausen, Willy Brandt Organizations: CNN, Red Army Faction, RAF, East, Stasi, Dresdner Bank, Germany’s Public, Office, Police, ARD, ” Reuters, Bild, Red Brigades, Nihon, Springer, Criminal Police, West German Embassy, West, Meinhof Group, Reuters, Democratic, Deutsche Bank Locations: Berlin, West Germany, Kreuzberg, Bonn, Weiterstadt, German, Italy, Japan, West Berlin, Vietnam, Lower Saxony, Stockholm, Bavarian, Cologne, GDR, Democratic Republic

☆ Marco Raduano: Italian mafioso who escaped prison by tying bedsheets arrested during romantic dinner in France
▼ + stars: | 2024-02-02 | by ( Barbie Latza Nadeau | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +1 min

Rome CNN —An Italian mafia boss who escaped from a maximum security prison last year by using bed sheets to scale the walls has been captured in France, authorities say. Marco Raduano, the 40-year-old boss of the Gargano Mafia in the southern Italian region of Puglia, was caught Thursday outside a luxury restaurant in Bastia, Corsica, where he was dining with a female companion. Also apprehended was his right-hand man, Gianluigi Troiano, who fled house arrest in 2021 after detaching his electronic bracelet. Raduano’s escape by tying bed sheets from his prison window just under a year ago was caught on the penitentiary’s surveillance cameras. The escape lasted 16 seconds and he fled on foot with no guards noticing or giving chase, which led to an internal investigation of the maximum security prison.

Persons: Rome, Rome CNN —, Marco Raduano, Matteo Messina Denaro, Rauduona, Gianluigi Troiano, Raduano, Omar Trott Organizations: Rome CNN, Gargano Mafia, Anti, Mafia, The Spanish Guardia Civil, French Gendarmerie Nationale Locations: Italian, France, Puglia, Bastia, Corsica, Granada, Spain, Bari, Foggia, The Spanish, Vieste, Italy

More than 10 intelligence and police officials in five European countries including Britain, Germany and France told Reuters they are increasing surveillance of Islamist militants. A British security official said the war in Gaza was likely to become the biggest recruiter for Islamist militants since the Iraq war in 2003, and that calls for attacks on Jewish and Western targets had risen in Europe. Two Islamist militant attacks in France and Belgium last month killed three people, and these two countries, Austria, Slovenia and Bosnia-Herzegovina have raised their terrorism threat alert levels. LONE WOLVESSecurity officials say the main danger for Europe is probably from attacks by "lone wolves" — assailants who are radicalised, often online, but have no formal links to more established groups. Although a truce has come into effect in Gaza, both sides have said the war is far from over.

Persons: Gonzalo Fuentes, radicalised, Mark Rowley, al, Jochen Kopelke, It's, Kopelke, Israel, Peter Knoope, Knoope, Iman Atta, Germany's Kopelke, influencers, Europol, Thomas Renard, Juliette Jabkhiro, Angelo Amante, Johan Ahlander, Phil Blenkinsop, Timothy Organizations: REUTERS, Reuters, London, British, Islamic State, Islamic, WOLVES Security, Hamas, Dutch National, International Centre for, Timothy Heritage, Thomson Locations: Paris, France, BERLIN, Israel, Britain, Germany, Russia, China, Iran, Gaza, Iraq, Europe, Belgium, Austria, Slovenia, Bosnia, Herzegovina, Italy, al Qaeda, Islamic State, Qaeda, Afghanistan, Syria, United States, British, al, West

☆ More than 200 mobsters jailed in one of Italy’s biggest mafia trials
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-20 | by ( Barbie Latza Nadeau | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +2 min

Rome CNN —An Italian court has sentenced more than 200 crime gang members to a total of 2,200 years in prison, following the country’s largest mafia trial in three decades. It took the court one hour and 40 minutes to hand down its rulings, Italian news outlet Ansa reported. Among those tried were 42 women – a record for a mafia trial – of whom 39 were convicted. The trial took place in a specially-built bunker in Lamezia Temre, southern Italy, amid safety concerns. Valeria Ferraro/APThe mobsters were affiliated with Italy’s notorious ’Nrangheta crime group and were convicted of mafia association, extortion, bribery and five murders.

Persons: Rome, Rome CNN —, –, ” “, Giancarlo Pittelli, Giorgio Naselli, Michele Marinaro, Gianluca Callipo, Luigi Incarnato, Pietro Giamborino, Valeria Ferraro, Scott, Scott W, Sieben Organizations: Rome CNN, onetime Forza Italia, CNN, Italy’s, United, Italian DIA, Mafia Locations: Lamezia Terme, Temre, Italy, United States, Italian, Calabria

Homeland Security, as well as companies that help identify counterfeit products such as Israel’s BrandShield. Fake weight-loss drugs will be a key focus in the agency’s annual counterfeit medicines report, due next year, the official said. “We have counterfeit products and stolen products,” the official said. "We will look online and if we find something that infringes (obesity drug trademarks) we'll get it taken down,” said Yoav Keren, BrandShield CEO. When a consumer buys those fakes, “what you get are expired drugs, counterfeit drugs, or nothing,” he added.

Persons: George Frey, Eli Lilly, BrandShield, Novo’s Ozempic, ”, Jim Mancuso, Mancuso, Europol, Novo, Lilly, “, Ozempic, Yoav Keren, MHRA, Eli, Mounjaro, Patrick Wingrove, Aurora Ellis Organizations: Novo Nordisk, Pharmacy, REUTERS, Novo Nordisk’s, Pharmaceutical Security Institute, drugmakers Novo Nordisk, Europol, Interpol, U.S . Homeland Security, U.S . Food, Drug Administration, U.S . Department of Homeland, Coordination Center, PSI, Medicines, Healthcare, Agency, Health Organization, Ireland’s, Products Regulatory Authority, Reuters, Thomson Locations: Provo , Utah, U.S, America, Europe, Germany, Egypt, Russia, North America

☆ X removes hundreds of Hamas-affiliated accounts since attack, CEO says
▼ + stars: | 2023-10-12 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

The logo of social media platform X, formerly Twitter, is seen alongside the former logo in this illustration taken, July 24, 2023. Breton said he had indications that X was being used to disseminate illegal content and disinformation in the European Union. The recently implemented Digital Services Act (DSA) requires large online platforms, including X and Meta's (META.O) Facebook, to remove illegal content and to take measures to tackle the risks to public security and civic discourse. X has redistributed resources and refocused internal teams to address the rapidly evolving situation, Yaccarino said, without specifying the changes. She added that the Musk-owned company assembled a leadership group to assess the situation shortly after the attack.

Persons: Dado Ruvic, Linda, Yaccarino, Thierry Breton's, Elon Musk, Breton, Urvi Dugar, Alex Richardson, Angus MacSwan Organizations: REUTERS, Twitter, European Union, Services, Facebook, Thomson Locations: Israel, Bengaluru

☆ Elon Musk's X rebuts EU allegations of 'illegal' content about the Israel-Hamas conflict
▼ + stars: | 2023-10-12 | by ( Arjun Kharpal | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +2 min

Linda Yaccarino: CEO of X speaking with CNBC's Sara Eisen on Aug. 10th, 2023. In a letter posted on X, Yaccarino said that after the Hamas attack on Israel, the social media firm "assembled a leadership group to assess the situation." The CEO also detailed the company's policies around violent speech, synthetic or manipulated media and perpetrators of violent attacks. "X is committed to serving the public conversation, especially in critical moments like this and understands the importance of addressing any illegal content that may be disseminated through the platform," Yaccarino said. This year, the EU introduced the Digital Services Act (DSA), a sweeping piece of regulation that forces online platforms to police illegal content more aggressively or risk huge fines.

Persons: Linda Yaccarino, CNBC's Sara Eisen, CNBC Linda Yaccarino, Yaccarino, Thierry Breton, Elon Musk, Breton Organizations: CNBC, Hamas, European Union, Wednesday, X, EU, Israel, Digital Services Locations: Israel, Palestinian, U.S, Japan, Australia, EU

☆ Europe is investigating Elon Musk's X about Israel-Hamas misinformation, violence on the app
▼ + stars: | 2023-10-12 | by ( Jonathan Vanian | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +3 min

Thierry Breton, the European commissioner for the internal market, said on X that the European Union's executive arm, the European Commission, is investigating whether X is complying with the Digital Services Act. The act went into effect in late August, requiring platforms that have over 45 million monthly active users in the EU to scan for and remove illegal content from their services and to detail their methodologies. Breton sent a letter to X owner Elon Musk expressing concern about the spread of disinformation and "violent and terrorist" content on the service and urging Musk to respond within 24 hours time. "We continue to respond promptly to law enforcement requests from around the world, including EU member states," X said in the letter. "At the time of receipt of your letter, we had not received any notices from Europol relating to illegal content on the service."

Persons: Elon Musk, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Fatih Aktas, Thierry Breton, Breton, Musk, Mark Zuckerberg, Linda Yaccarino, X Organizations: Turkish, United Nations, UN, Anadolu Agency, Getty, European, European Commission, Digital Services, DSA, EC Locations: New York, United States, European, Israel

via REUTERS/File Photo Acquire Licensing RightsBRUSSELS, Oct 10 (Reuters) - The EU's industry chief told Elon Musk that disinformation was spreading on his X messaging platform since Palestinian Islamist group Hamas' surprise attack on Israel, urging him to take counter-measures in line with new EU online content rules. Thierry Breton said on Tuesday he had indications that X, formerly known as Twitter, was being used to disseminate illegal content and disinformation in the European Union. "I therefore invite you to urgently ensure that your systems are effective and report on the crisis measures taken to my team," Breton told Musk in a letter dated Oct. 10 and seen by Reuters. Responding to Breton's X posting, Musk said his company's policy was that everything is open source and transparent. "Please list the violations you allude to on X, so that the public can see them," he said on X.

Persons: Elon, Thierry Breton, Breton, Musk, Foo Yun Chee, Sudip Kar, Gupta, Mrinmay Dey, Chris Reese, Mark Heinrich, Jonathan Oatis Organizations: REUTERS, Rights, Twitter, European Union, Reuters, Digital Services, DSA, Thomson Locations: Rights BRUSSELS, Israel, Bengaluru

☆ Europe warns Elon Musk about misinformation and violence on X , formerly Twitter, related to Hamas-Israel conflict
▼ + stars: | 2023-10-10 | by ( Jonathan Vanian | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +3 min

X CEO Elon Musk leaves a U.S. Senate bipartisan Artificial Intelligence Insight Forum at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C., on Sept. 13, 2023. A European regulator has issued Elon Musk a stern warning about the spread of illegal content and disinformation on X, formerly known as Twitter, amid the Israel-Hamas conflict. Failure to comply with the European regulations around illegal content could result in fines worth 6% of a company's annual revenue. The commissioner said that recent "changes in public interest policies" caused confusion in "many European users." Watch: Elon Musk has "cut off the good guys, empowered the bad guys."

Persons: Elon Musk, Elon, Thierry Breton, Musk, Breton, X Organizations: Senate, Intelligence, U.S, Capitol, Washington , D.C, Digital Services, European Commission, European Union, EU Locations: U.S, Washington ,, Israel

CNN —A Mafia boss who spent nearly three decades evading law enforcement before he was arrested in January has died while receiving medical treatment, according to Italian media reports. Crime was a family affair for Messina Denaro, born to a known Mafia boss in Sicily on April 26, 1962. Among those arrested in the 2009-2010 crackdown was his brother, Salvatore Messina Denaro, who refused to testify about his whereabouts. In 2013, his sister, Patrizia Messina Denaro, was sentenced to 14 years in prison, a term she is still serving, for being a member of the Mafia. Felia Allum, professor of comparative organized crime and corruption at the UK’s University of Bath, said in January that Messina Denaro was the last of an old generation of Mafia bosses.

Persons: CNN —, Matteo Messina Denaro, San Salvatore, Rai, Maurizio de Lucia, Messina Denaro, Giovanni Falcone, Paolo Borsellino, Falcone, Borsellino, Giuseppe Di Matteo, Maddalena, Bernardo Provenzano, Salvatore Messina Denaro, Patrizia Messina Denaro, Felia Allum, ” Organizations: CNN, Cosa Nostra, San, Sicilian Mafia, Cosa, Mafia, UK’s University of Bath Locations: L’Aquila, Italy, Palermo, Europe, Milan, Florence, Rome, Messina, €, Corleone, Sicily, Cosa

☆ Brazil Sees Amazon Rainforest International Security Hub Launch This Year
▼ + stars: | 2023-09-13 | by ( Sept. | At P.M. | ) www.usnews.com time to read: +2 min

By Ricardo BritoBRASILIA (Reuters) - Brazil is preparing to launch a center for international police cooperation to combat environmental crimes and drug trafficking in the Amazon rainforest by the end of 2023, Federal Police officials told Reuters. The center, agreed upon at the summit of Amazon nations in August, will bring together police authorities from the eight countries of the Amazon Cooperation Treaty Organization (ACTO). Uniting the Amazon countries against criminal activity in the world's largest rainforest is key to President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva's effort to restore Brazil's environmental credentials after four years of soaring deforestation under predecessor Jair Bolsonaro. "We expect to see a significant reduction in environmental crimes in the area and also action involving the entire Amazon region and not just a few isolated countries," Urquiza said. "There's no point in operating only in Brazil," he said, adding that criminals in the region move around the countries of the rainforest to evade authorities.

Persons: Ricardo Brito, Luiz Inacio Lula da, Jair Bolsonaro, Valdecy Urquiza, Urquiza, Humberto Freire, Ameripol, Freire, Peter Frontini, Timothy Gardner Organizations: Ricardo Brito BRASILIA, Reuters, Federal Police, Amazon Cooperation Treaty Organization, Federal Police's, Police, Interpol Locations: Brazil, Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, Guyana, Peru, Suriname, Venezuela

☆ Scientists found more than 1,000 AI spam bots trying to scam people and steal their social media profiles — and regulators can't keep up
▼ + stars: | 2023-08-24 | by ( Shubham Agarwal | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +7 min

One of the latest is flooding social media with spam bots and AI-generated content that could further degrade the quality of information on the internet. Botnets are networks of hundreds of harmful bots and spam campaigns on social media that can go undetected by current anti-spam filters. We can still detect AI-generated spam — for nowBoth NewsGuard and the paper's researchers were separately able to unearth AI-generated spam content using an obvious tell that chatbots currently have. AdvertisementAdvertisementResearchers look for when these responses slip out in an automated bot's content, whether on a webpage or in a tweet. AdvertisementAdvertisementOne such measure was tagging AI-generated content with a hidden label to help people distinguish it from content made by humans, per the White House.

Persons: Kai, Cheng Yang, Filippo Menczer, Yang, Menczer, ChatGPT, chatbots, Wei Xu, Europol, Xu, Biden Organizations: Indiana University, Twitter, ChatGPT, Indiana University's Observatory, Social Media, telltale, Georgia Institute of Technology, Regulators, Google, Microsoft, House Locations: Indiana

☆ Phishing scams targeting small business on social media including Meta are a 'gold mine' for criminals
▼ + stars: | 2023-08-15 | by ( Ellen Sheng | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +6 min

CNBC quarterly surveys of small business owners in recent years have indicated that many do not rate the risk of cyberattack highly, yet the FBI says that in recent years a wave of hacks has targeted small business. Small business owners say social media giants such as Meta have done little to help them address the problem. Malware can target victims through email phishing, browser extensions, ads and mobile apps and various social media platforms. According to SCORE, a nonprofit partly funded by the U.S. Small Business Administration, nearly half of small business owners cited social media as their preferred digital marketing channel. And social media accounts of small businesses are like a gold mine," said Joseph Steinberg, a cyber security privacy and AI expert, who sees small business social media accounts as "low hanging fruit."

Persons: it's, Pat Bennett, Pat's Granola, Bennett, hasn't, Pat Bennett Bennett's, Joseph Steinberg, Bryan Palma, Europol, Palma, Cai Dixon, Dixon Organizations: Facebook, Meta, CNBC, FBI, SCORE, U.S . Small Business Administration, YouTube Locations: Cleveland, Europe

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