BANKRUPT BANKER
International fraud in which a gang allegedly made thousands of pounds downloading its own songs from online music stores
Sunday, 14 June 2009
International fraud in which a gang allegedly made thousands of pounds downloading its own songs from online music stores with stolen credit cards has been cracked by the Metropolitan police and the FBI, the Met claimed yesterday.The gang are alleged to have made several songs which they gave to an online US company, which then uploaded them to be sold on iTunes and Amazon.Over five months they bought the songs thousands of times, spending around $750,000 (£468,750) on 1,500 stolen US and UK credit cards, according to the Met. The criminal network then also allegedly reaped the royalties from the tracks, pulling in an estimated $300,000, paid by the two sites, which were unaware of the fraud being committed against them.Sixty officers from the Met's central e-crime unit today arrested seven men and three women in London, Birmingham, Kent and Wolverhampton.They are being held at police stations in London and the Midlands on suspicion of conspiracy to commit fraud and money launderingScotland Yard said the arrests were the result of a parallel investigation with the FBI that began in February.Detective Chief Inspector Terry Wilson, of the e-crime unit, said: "This has been a complex investigation to establish what we believe to be an international conspiracy to defraud Apple and Amazon. This investigation, with its national and international dimension, exemplifies why we have set up this national response to e-crime.
