Germany’s Million Mask Scam Foiled as Organized Crime Goes Online
With coronavirus cramping the usual activities of gangsters,
organized crime is increasingly going online, experts said on Thursday,
following the bust of a group attempting to sell millions of non-existent masks
to German health authorities.
Europol announced this week that authorities and financial
institutions in several countries
cooperated in the sting, which targeted fraudsters who used sham email
addresses, as well as fake and cloned websites, in an effort to rob the German
government of as much as 2.4 million euros. Two people have been arrested in
the ongoing investigation.
The attempted robbery highlights how criminal groups have
turned to online scams to make up for revenue losses caused by the pandemic,
said Lucia Bird, a senior cybercrime analyst at the Global Initiative Against
Transnational Organised Crime.
“If you look at some of the types of crimes that have
spiked, phishing is one of them,” she said, referring to a scam in which criminals
pose as legitimate institutions to convince people to reveal sensitive
information such as credit card numbers.
“You can buy a phishing kit online for around $50, and some
marketplaces are even offering discounts on cybercrime kits and software given
the boom in opportunity,” Bird said by phone from London.
German health authorities realised they had been targeted
only after paying a down payment for the masks. Authorities in Germany,
Ireland, The Netherlands and the United Kingdom then sprang into action in an
operation coordinated by the transnational law enforcement agencies Europol and
Interpol.
Working with financial institutions, investigators managed
to prevent the funds from reaching their final destination, Nigeria, Europol
said.
“We know that Europol are tracking a number of mask-related
scams through Europe, and there have been many reports of similar incidents
elsewhere,” Bird said. “In a number of these cases, the funds were transferred
and not recalled in time, and it remains to be seen if they can be recovered.”
Since the outbreak of the pandemic, OCCRP has reported how
the disease has fueled an explosion in cybercriminal activity around the world,
from low-level scams like phishing and deceptive advertising, to fraudsters
impersonating governments and international health organisations.
The case announced this week by Europol showed a tech-savvy
group working across borders to enmesh German health authorities in a
sophisticated scam.
German authorities had recruited two private companies,
based in Zurich and Hamburg, to procure €15 million worth of medical masks.
The companies – which were legitimate – initially contacted
a website registered in Spain and ordered 10 million masks. When the delivery
failed to come through, the website referred the companies to a dealer in
Ireland, who in turn put them in contact with a supplier registered in The
Netherlands.
Following an initial downpayment of 1.5 million euros to
secure the first batch, the buyers received an email, ostensibly from the Dutch
company, claiming it had not received the money. The fraudulent company
demanded an emergency transfer of a further €880,000 to secure the shipment.
After the masks again failed to arrive, the buyers
discovered that the Dutch supplier’s site had been cloned by the scammers. The
real company had no record of the order or the payments.
A race against time then ensued to stop the transfers before
the money was lost. Europol and Interpol coordinated with banks in Ireland, the
UK and The Netherlands to freeze the transactions.
The banks were able to return the funds, according to
Europol, which said it continues to support the investigation in several
European countries.
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