[172747] in North American Network Operators' Group
Re: Next steps in extortion case - ideas?
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Justin M. Streiner)
Sat Jul 5 18:41:08 2014
X-Original-To: nanog@nanog.org
Date: Sat, 5 Jul 2014 16:02:29 -0400 (EDT)
From: "Justin M. Streiner" <streiner@cluebyfour.org>
To: "nanog@nanog.org" <nanog@nanog.org>
In-Reply-To: <CAKsAWyn3SUG74CZD-5zc-+8djRtEWskH8AZ4Nj2mHRat03fiZQ@mail.gmail.com>
Errors-To: nanog-bounces@nanog.org
On Sat, 5 Jul 2014, C. A. Fillekes wrote:
> Furthermore, since the internet is everywhere, I pointed out (or did you
> stop reading after I mentioned that we don't actually know the gender of
> the scammer?) Markus has the option of pursuing this in a jurisdiction
> where the penalties for criminal defamation are the harshest. It would not
> have to be in the US.
Unless one or more of the plaintiffs is located a country with the harshest
penalities, or a plaintiff can otherwise demonstrate how people in country
XYZ are being harmed by the scammer's actions, I don't see that going very
far. A plaintiff in Germany trying to bring a case to court in Singapore
against a defendant in the United States isn't going to work so well. I
am not a lawyer, but my guess is that the case would be thrown out because
the plaintiff would lack standing to bring a case to court in that
country.
Yes, the global Internet is a global communications tool, but that doesn't
mean you can cherry-pick which country to use in trying a case just because
the extortion is taking place over the Internet.
> Finally, you fail to address the one very simple way I described to
> determine who this scammer is: follow the money. Make a small partial
> payment on this supposed "debt" and see who cashes the check. Much easier
> than trying to follow "him" around on the internet, though that would be
> made easier in the course of negotiating a partial payment.
This is much easier to do once law enforcement agencies are engaged. They
can trace the money trail more throughly and effectively than you or I
can, as civilians.
jms
