Computer Fraud

A newly appointed attorney for recently convicted private eye Anthony Pellicano has filed court documents alleging jury bias and misconduct and asking for a new trial. In court documents filed Monday, San Francisco-based attorney Steven Gruel said that a juror had told his investigators that some deliberating occurred without the full jury present, and that the forewoman lied to the judge, saying she did not hear the prosecutor characterize a lead defense witness as a liar. Pellicano, known as a private eye to the stars, was his own attorney during a lengthy trial in which he was ultimately convicted in May of numerous federal charges, including wire-tapping, racketeering, and computer fraud.

Carnegie Mellon University researchers are using an old adage to develop anti-fraud software for Internet auction sites like EBay: It's not what you know, it's who you know. Sites such as EBay rely on users to warn others if they have a bad experience with a seller by rating their transactions.

California consumers will learn next month whether their favorite shopping sites are steeled against computer fraud -- or are haunted by hackers and identity thieves. Starting July 1, companies must warn California customers of security holes in their corporate computer networks. When a retailer discovers that credit card numbers in its files have been stolen, it must e-mail customers, essentially saying, "We've been hacked, and the hacker may have your credit card number."

Two former Cisco Systems Inc. accountants pleaded guilty to computer-fraud charges, admitting that they illegally transferred $7.8 million in company stock to their personal brokerage accounts, prosecutors said. Geoffrey Osowski, 30, and Wilson Tang, 35, face up to five years in prison for misusing Cisco's computer system to obtain more than 230,000 shares of stock in the largest maker of computer-networking equipment.

Even as the IRS was assuring taxpayers last year that electronic filing of tax returns was secure, serious shortcomings existed that could have allowed hackers to view and even change information on returns, a government watchdog agency said. The General Accounting Office found no evidence that hacking had occurred, but it said its investigators were able to gain unauthorized access to the tax agency's electronic filing system, which will handle a third of all federal returns this year.

RealNetworks Inc. has filed suit seeking to stop consumers' lawsuits that claim the No. 1 maker of software used to play online music and video violated privacy laws by accessing information from users' computer hard drives without permission. The suit filed in state court in Seattle claims that any disputes should be settled through arbitration under terms of a licensing agreement that governs the relationship between RealNetworks and its customers.

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission's top cop said Monday that the agency may file charges soon against at least one company that offers free stock to people for visiting its Internet site. "These giveaways are illegal more often than not," SEC enforcement director Richard H. Walker said in a speech. "You can expect to hear more from us on this topic soon."

Law enforcement officials and stalking experts said Friday that a North Hollywood cyber-stalking case is a frightening example of how technology has spawned a new breed of crime that is proliferating, difficult to police and devastating to many of its victims.

In the first prosecution under a new state cyber-stalking statute, a North Hollywood man has been charged with using the Internet in an attempt to set up the rape of a woman who had spurned his romantic advances. The case, which underscores the darker consequences of the Internet's power as a vast but largely anonymous medium, centers on the chilling account of a North Hollywood woman.

A Los Angeles federal judge ordered four men to repay more than $1 million they reportedly bilked from investors in an alleged scheme to sell and lease back ATMs, the Securities and Exchange Commission said. U.S. District Judge George King also ordered the four to stop selling unregistered securities and selling securities by fraudulent means.