DarkMarket_ Cyberthieves, Cybercops and You - Misha Glenny [90]
If things weren’t baffling enough already, they took an even stranger turn soon after Inspector Sen returned home to Ankara. A weird image was circulating on the Web.
Bilal could barely contain his anger and frustration. Agent Mularski had sent him a photograph, which had appeared on Haber 7’s website and then the San Francisco-based Wired magazine. Sitting on a chair in his underpants was the mystery man, Kier, being compelled, it appeared, to hold up a piece of paper on which was written:
1 I AM KIER. MY REAL NAME IS MERT ORTAÇ
2 I AM PARTNER OF THE MEDIA
3 I AM RAT. I AM PIG.
4 I AM REPORTER
5 I AM FUCKED BY ChaO
Half of Istanbul’s police force was looking in vain for Kier – or Mert Ortaç, to give him his real name – but Cha0 had succeeded not only in tracking him down, but in kidnapping and humiliating him as well. It was perfectly possible that the man’s life was in danger. What in God’s name was going on?
For Bilal Sen, it was axiomatic that to take at face value anything related to the Web was unwise. As an experienced surfer of criminal boards and a student of people’s Internet behaviour, he knew that people lied, cheated, exaggerated, deceived and conspired as a matter of course. But the history of DarkMarket in Europe, and especially in Turkey, went beyond this quotidian dissimulation to evolve into a surreal tale of skulduggery, espionage and betrayal. And one with no apparent end.
Part II
28
CIAO, CHA0
From his research on DarkMarket with Keith Mularski, Inspector sen knew that Cha0 had his own website: CrimeEnforcers.com (a play on the phrase Law Enforcers, which the criminal fraternity long ago reduced to the acronym LE as it cropped up so frequently in online discussions).
On the CrimeEnforcers home page, Cha0 explained its aims and services:
We are private organisation for your special developing requests. We are focused at Electronic and Computer Engineering. If you need special hardwares (especially hi-tech) nor software that can not be done or even discuss in your Country because of any reason such as laws etc. then u are at the very right place.
We are offering absolutely anonymous & offshore developing for your projects. We dont care what you want to do with hardwares and softwares you requested to be done by us.
Needless to say, your privacy is very important for us and we dont share with anyone else because of any reason. We don’t need your Name, Adress etc. We only need your email. You will have a certificate and account for secure login to our private forum for tracking your development, you even may ask question to engineers who engineering your project.
If you reach this Web Site then you already know us. We are not cheap developers and we cant make partnership with you. If you wish to your dreams to come true then u have to have enough money to invest for your dreams. You even have to pay for request for quote from us for your project.
Once you adapted to his slightly mangled Globish, Cha0’s business plan became clear. He was offering logistical services and backup for anyone interested in exploring a career in cybercrime. Rather than commit the crimes himself, he was making it easier for less-skilled computer users to engage in the practice. Computer crime was beginning to ape business models from the real world.
On other pages of CrimeEnforcers.com you could review Cha0’s wares. His signature product was the skimmer, and it was not long before Cha0’s mail-order service for skimming devices flourished into a significant business.
CrimeEnforcers also offered mobile credit-card readers – portable point-of-sale (POS) devices of the sort you find in most restaurants. In early 2007 police officers in several parts of England uncovered a ring of petrol-station attendants who