That would depend on what kind of Proxy you are using, there are any number of paid, and a few free, proxy services that keep no logs (Tor, Anonymizer). A good low-tech approach for occasional use would be the free wireless offered at a coffee shop (in the States a lot of these places don't ask for ID or registration). But I'm sure that if the US government wanted to bag your ass bad enough, they could have the CIA drop everything and set up a dedicated task force to hunt you down. But are they likely to go to all that trouble for some perv trolling the teen chat rooms?

However, if you know some super-cool, high-tech, geeky way to disguise your IP so that not even the NSA could find you out, please PM me - or maybe point me to a website. I'm always ready to learn something new.

Mars, you're probably right about the no ID internet cafes.

The CIA have other targets to keep themselves busy, but if the Feds want to trace you they have the resources. There have been busts of seriously intelligent net gurus by the FBI who have some of the some best people on the planet for this, including some who themselves were on the wrong side of the law before they put on the white hats. You're probably right though about the priorities, they would be going for the big fish, but we've seen quite a few minnows being netted as part of these investigations and bravo for that.

Not always, and note that these cases are often solved because the perp made some non-tech mistake.

Check out this article describing a recent case involving massive data theft in the States.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/1 ... &pagewanted=all

Note that the Feds were only able to finally ID the guy because:

"In the end, it was a reference to a “Seinfeld” character that helped Secret Service agents untangle the mystery. Agents connected the ICQ user name to an e-mail address at a Russian-based Internet provider, [email protected], a reference to a cantankerous soup maker in the program."

I remember the soup nazi - "No Soup For You".    

Wow, guess that's why you shoudl never put much of yourself into usernames and passwords XD.

yeah, I love Seinfeld ..... step forward, shuffle sideways and question the bread status, etc. ... "NO SOUP FOR YOU! ...6 MONTHS! Btw, this episode was based on a real NY character who tried to sue the show's makers.

The operative word in your post is "only", whereas in the article subject of the link it just says it "helped", quote - "was a reference to a 'Seinfeld' character that helped Secret Service agents untangle the mystery". It's drawing a long bow to say the FBI (or Secret Service) would not have solved the case otherwise .... accepted it would have taken them longer, (and they are very patient).

It's a good article but not representative of the normal FBI investigation as they had to deal with someone who was an insider, in effect a "double agent". The soup nazi reference was the catalyst for them taking the unusual step of including "in-house" in their investigations.

Some interesting links on this subject, the first from "Wired", a fine publication, and the second deals with a movie on the subject but quotes at length former FBI special agent Ernest Hilbert who in essence says - there's no such thing as an untraceable cyber criminal:
http://www.wired.com/politics/law/news/2007/07/fbi_spyware
http://www.mtv.com/movies/news/articles/1578986/story.jhtml

Cheers,
F.
PS: just realised I should qualify my references to the FBI .... this is where the "sub" thread started, Mars' link intoduced the "Service Service" angle.

[ Last edited by  Froddo at 12-9-2008 20:12 ]

The 'soupnazi' case was written up in the Times because it was solved; likewise with the bomb-threat case linked to in your post. The FBI doesn't discuss unsolved computer crimes, which rarely become news.

These online cases are usually solved because the perps get carried away with hubris, they get lazy, or they commit some tactical error; but sure the FBI has some really smart people on the payroll. However, the guy you link to, who states that every computer can be traced by it's IP address, doesn't mention those people who take extraordinary pains to disguise that address. Either IP address can be irretrievably hidden or they cannot. (I'm still waiting to hear from goodjob about his high-tech method of hiding IP addresses. I've even sent the guy a PM.) Beyond the free wireless method I mentioned above, there are people who drive around until they find an unsecured home WiFi setup - it appears that some 40% of home wireless base stations are wide open to anyone within logon range!

In any case, I've read that billions are lost each year in online frauds that never get solved. There is so much online crime that the authorities can't even begin to investigate most of it. So the things we read about are not only just the solved crimes - those cases that make the coppers look good - but also the crimes important enough to be investigated in the first place. Think of all the Nigerian email fraud that goes unpunished. Virtually all the lower-level credit card fraud is never solved.

The sad truth is that the world is not a safe place, and justice frequently doesn't prevail. If (online)crime never paid, except for crimes of passion or nutjobbers, there wouldn't be any (online)crime.

I think we are both in agreement that pursuing cyber crime comes down to priorities ..... it costs money to prosecute and this will be spent according to the severity and/or political pressure e.g. pedophile networks will definitely be pursued. I agree too a lot of crimes are solved because the perps get lazy or hubris, but there are also those who are just plain stupid such as the peds who gave their credit card details to buy net child porn.

Goodjob's point was related to your statement that you could troll the net from you home PC using proxy to be untraceable, quote Goodjob - 'Proxy only hides your IP not erase your IP'.  I know you asked Goodjob if he had better ways to be untraceable, but I didn't see where he actually said he would, or could, provide this.

Agree cyber crime is a $B industry, it's a mixed bag of people exploiting the net, and external to the net e.g. card fraud is often by way of a "palmed" card reader copying the mag strip, or the tampered ATM to record the card and film the keying of the pin code, or instances like the Bank of NY which just had a courier lose some backup tapes containing the account details of over 12M customers. Another reason you won't read about successful prosecutions (or unresolved ones) is the institutions don't want their brand name tarnished, they will do all they can to keep breaches out of the public domain.

There have been some arrests regarding the "Nigerian" scam, but where the perps are living offshore, (like in he UK), the Government of Nigeria does not provide the sort of cooperation needed, but Western Governments will. Anyway, if someone falls for the "Nigerian" scam it's hard to have sympathy for them as they themselves are acting dishonestly, motivated by greed.

Mars, if you think you can beat the system then go for it.
By the time you read this response I will have traced your home address and you will shortly receive two supreme pizzas from me as a way of saying hi ......... (just joking) .

[ Last edited by  Froddo at 14-9-2008 12:31 ]

If not would, that's definitely a statement of could - but I suspect that was just a bit of braggadocio for effect.

Relax Sin City Boy, I've no interest in committing the perfect online crime - my interest in this is purely technical.

And I am NO expert, but the more I look into this whole hiding one's IP thing, the more difficult it does seem. Found this very interesting article on the potential weaknesses of the TOR network of anonymous proxies I mentioned earlier (http://perimetergrid.com/wp/2007 ... tor-and-its-limits/) It basically says that if some government org wanted to, it could take over a sufficient number of the TOR network exit points to be able to ID you. However, that would only work to ferret out someone already known to be committing an ongoing crime - i.e., they would have to be waiting for you. Therefore, using TOR with a 'borrowed' free wireless base station would seem to offer crack-proof anonymity for one-off hacking, sabotage, etc.

But let's not forget that this discussion was kicked off by my post on hiding one's ID from local police entrapment of a chat room trawler. Until the guy actually shows up at the girl's home, he isn't even committing a crime, so the idea that the NSA is going to take over a private proxy network to hunt the guy down is absurd. Until he walked into the girl's home, not only was he innocent of any crime, if he had been using something like the TOR network, even from his own home, he would have been unknown to the coppers.

As the TOR article points out, most of these crimes are solved by the non-computer aspects of the crimes, online crimes included, such as money transfers, etc.

Hold the anchovies.

yeah I don't like anchovies either.

In Australia it is a crime before the chump arrives at the child's home. NSW was the last State to pass laws on this.
Some highlights:
"to make it an offence for an adult to procure or groom a child for unlawful sexual activity".
"procuring a child under the age of 14, imprisonment for a maximum of 15 years; procuring a child under the age of 16 years, imprisonment for a maximum of 12 years; grooming a child under 14 years of age, imprisonment for a maximum of 12 years; and grooming a child under 16 years of age, imprisonment for a maximum of 10 years.

"The law allows police to catch cyber predators by providing that it is irrelevant to the offence that the child is a fictitious person represented by an adult".

CRIMES AMENDMENT (SEXUAL PROCUREMENT OR GROOMING OF CHILDREN) BILL 2007
http://www.parliament.nsw.gov.au ... V3Key/LA20071128005
http://www.aic.gov.au/publications/htcb/htcb017.html

The UK also has laws making the actual "grooming" an offence in it's own right. I believe Italy and Singapore do too.

The USA has Federal laws they can use to prosecute under existing legislation:
"Whoever knowingly persuades, induces, entices, or coerces any individual to travel in interstate or foreign commerce, or in any Territory or Possession of the United States, to engage in prostitution, or in any sexual activity for which any person can be charged with a criminal offense, or attempts to do so, shall be fined under this
title or imprisoned not more than 10 years, or both".

Individual States such as Florida and Georgia have specific "Grooming" legislation.

I'm sure there are those here (many of them English) who appreciate the headsup on that! Can't say it really surprises me.

However, the word 'travel' in the US law would seem to offer defense against prosecution in those instances where the girl hasn't hit the highway - in Catch a Pred, the guys are always enticed to visit the girl at her home where Hanson and his camera crew are hiding in a closet. I zero in on the word 'travel' because in the States we have an overlapping legal system. The US, being a union of pre-existing independent states, has many crimes that are not subject to Federal law unless the perp crosses state lines - kidnapping, for instance. Your quote implies that only in a few(?) states like Florida and Georgia would the creep be indictable if the girl didn't cross state lines. So I wonder if the "Catch a Pred" TV sting was staged only in those states with Grooming laws.

I assure you Froddo (why 2 d's?), if I were one of those losers, in addition to trawling chat rooms via the TOR network, I would have been very clear about which states had no Grooming laws, and would have been very careful not to specifically mention sex in any on-line discussion with someone claiming to be a minor. Prisons are full of idiots.

[ Last edited by  Marsupial at 17-9-2008 18:46 ]

I have no idea how factual the movie is but if they can do 50% of what they claim, there is no perfect crime unless you can somehow reroute an IP to RUSSIA or some country with no jurisdiction according to the movie.

A teacher here in Hong Kong had sex with his 10-year old student and has just been sentenced
to 6 years in jail. With time off for good behaviour, he'll be out in 4 years. How dumb is that?

Okay I'll bullet point my response:

    * I have quoted AUS law as that is where I live and I thought with a tag like "Marsupial" you were from here too  ... irrelevant I know, looks like you are US citizen.
    * I listed Georgia and Florida as these were mentioned in representations to the UK Government when they were considering such "grooming laws". You would need a US lawyer to give an opinion on the 50 individual US States, whether such laws were in place, and how viable, but knowing how much US lawyers charge I think it would be a very expensive exercise.
    * You are correct on the very old cross state laws in the USA, the Feds need to include refs to this to override State law, giving the FBI jurisdiction.
    * A predator on a chat room won't know if they are grooming a child from interstate (or even in another country)... if  interstate then it would be interesting to get a US legal eagle's opinion if they are subject to FBI prosecution by crossing State lines via the net in their attempts to coerce/induce.
    * A US citizen was arrested a while ago when he arrived in AUS for his date with his "child" date ... he must have got quite a shock.
    * Why 2 d's?  Many people like the "Frodo" character and the tag is usually taken, so I am in the hobbit, I mean habit of using "Froddo".
    * I expect the "Catch a Ped" show also wants the guy to turn up at the "child's" home for dramatic effect, it would be pretty boring to just film the crew turning up at his house, and of course he would just deny everything anyway.
    * 'Prisons are full of idiots',   well no surprise there ...... all you kids finish school and get a good job!

[ Last edited by  Froddo at 16-9-2008 23:27 ]

I have no idea why I chose Marsupial, it just popped into my mind. Tho, if I were to source Tolkien for my username, it would be 'Bombadil'.

I think we can leave the discussion of which states are ped friendly to those with a more pressing need to know.

I thought the Sin City avatar and the Tolkien username were an odd match.

Hey Baggins, you some kind of lawyer?

Bombadil would suit you.

Sin City is not such a bad match for the things I like about HK / Macau ....

S/W Contract law amongst other things (I've worked in ITC for 25+ years) . I'm jealous of my criminal law friends, it's much more interesting.