Balkanalysis.com

Alarm as Macedonia Driven Towards Internet Extinction

Starting about a month ago, Balkanalysis.com has learned, residents of Macedonia have been unable to access an ever-increasing number of American websites. Certain commercially compiled reports commonly purchased by American ISPs and hosting companies are warning that the country is a hotbed of internet fraud- and so, these companies are starting to block access to their sites for anyone with a Macedonian IP address. These cowardly and ignorant companies- who can’t tell Macedonia from Massachusetts, by the way- are bringing on an internet Ice Age that could make life in Macedonia virtually extinct in the near future.According to Macedonia resident Sam Vaknin, economist, author and internet expert, “…commercially compiled lists of ‘dangerous countries’ for internet scams, viruses, lotteries, etc. are being sold to ISPs and hosting companies… every day, I find another website has disappeared… last week it was an investment company related to Fidelity, yesterday a mental health website, today a radio program from the US.”

While this appears to have been an entirely corporate initiative, political lobbying behind the scenes may also play a role.

“The fact that Russia and Israel- 2 epicenters of internet fraud and hacking on a global scale- 500 zillion trillion times bigger offenders than little Macedonia- are off the list is incredible,” charges Vaknin. Yet these countries also have a much stronger political lobby within the United States than does the beleaguered Balkan state.

American ignorance of Macedonia (and the outside world in general) is revealed by this idiotic warning from the so-called “Bureau of Export Administration”:

“…pay close attention to shipping or contact addresses located in countries with a high reported incidence of online fraud and many e-commerce web sites have found a high incidents of on-line fraud as well, such as Africa, Nigeria, Macedonia, Colombia, etc..”

Not only does this sentence violate grammar, it also transgresses geographical good sense (since when was ‘Africa’ a country?) and unfairly lumps Macedonia in with other, utterly different nations, quoting no specific sources to justify its inclusion in the list. And, despite its deceptive title and American-eagle background logo, the website (named “Exportbureau.com”) is not governmental. Rather, this self-proclaimed “manufacturing and export information association” claims to be

“…a non profit organization [that] has been providing a completely free unbiased worldwide export manufacturing company directory to the worldwide public for the past 5 years since late 1998.”

Or not…

On 19 March 2004, computer fraud was added to the Macedonian criminal code for the first time, in reaction to an initial (and relatively minor) upsurge of email lottery fraud and (non-internet) identity theft.

The first known case of identity theft in Macedonia occurred last year when a couple of young men, in affiliation with a foreign partner supplying plastic cards with magnetic strips, were able to knock off a few ATMs. However, the police soon put an end to this amateurish scheme, which succeeded in taking only 12,000 euros-peanuts in comparison to the $1.5 million snatched from New York ATMs by the Russian mafia in one case last year, or the Israeli mafia’s multi-national ATM-milking efforts in 2002.

Moreover, Macedonia has a very low rate of general internet use. Leading Macedonian information technology site Metamorphosis recently lamented that

“…unless the number of Internet users in our country [increases] in the following years, Macedonia will be confronted with information and technology dark age because of the inability for fast information exchange with the region and the world as a whole. According to the latest research only 2% to 5% of the citizens in Macedonia use Internet. Only 26 from 100 citizens with computers are connecting to Internet.”

Indeed, how a tiny country having no more than 90,000 total internet users and a handful of internet companies can pose a threat to the stability of American commerce and American online companies is beyond comprehension.

Of course, not only “Wild East” countries like Russia and Israel exceed little Macedonia in terms of online criminal output. It would be utter hypocrisy to ignore the vast internet fraud industry in the United States itself. The most recent statistics compiled by the US government’s Internet Fraud Complaint Center reveal that, out of $54 million mischievously siphoned away from American consumers in 2002, a whopping 77.4 percent stemmed from auction fraud and non-delivery of items- in other words, frauds perpetrated largely by Americans against other Americans. Credit/debit card fraud weighed in next, at 11.6 percent. Yet is anyone planning to eliminate eBay, or the convenience of on-line banking?

Even the infamous “Nigerian letter fraud” accounted for 0.4 percent of the 2002 online scams in America. So where were all of those swashbuckling Macedonian online pirates, anyway? Certainly, Macedonian cyber-crime could have come into existence after that time. Still, it is utterly negligible on a global scale- and always will be.

Aside from that, there is always the argument for ineptitude. If someone is stupid enough to give away their bank details every time a fake Citibank email reaches them, or to “invest” every time an “urgent letter” from the grandson of the deposed King of Rhodesia in-exile arrives electronically, then they probably deserve to be stripped of their assets. So why should Macedonia ’s internet existence go the way of the dodo just because some people are sitting ducks?

Further, consider the analogy of the age-old fraud-by-post scams: has their existence ever been understood to mean by any sane person that we should shut down the postal service?

Yet not only the reasoning behind the Macedonian blacklist is dubious- so are the methods being used. Why would a company trying to minimize fraud and security dangers block an entire country, through blocking IP addresses, when it is so easy for anyone with computer sense to “spoof” or “cloak” their IP, thus appearing to be out of the country? “This is idiotic!” laments Vaknin. “The only people this hurts are the innocent users- teenagers, housewives, college professors, etc. Any hacker or fraudster will be unaffected by these activities!”

In addition, the timid American companies have many other options for dealing with individual problematic entities, like blocking those sites or disabling forms. Why should an entire country pay the price for the illicit actions of a few, especially when it is detrimental to everyone involved- not least of all the business of the American companies?

The most disturbing part of the whole story, however, is the element of secrecy surrounding it.

When Sam Vaknin fir
st noticed the mysterious disappearance of certain websites, he wrote to the webmasters to ask what was wrong. In regard to one case – involving a well known mental health website – he makes the following devastating allegation:

“…they lied to me for a full month, telling me that the problem was due to my firewall settings. They lied to me knowing damn well that they had blocked the entire country. When I continued to press them, however, they admitted that they were following the recommendations of a commercially compiled blacklist. They were trying to keep it secret that US entities are blocking whole countries!”

Vaknin’s experience is being reported by others. A list one anonymous internet entrepreneur received this week from a large American ISP and hosting company apologized for the inclusion of Macedonia – as well as Bulgaria, Ghana, Indonesia, Malaysia, Nigeria, Pakistan, Romania and Vietnam – in the current ranks of the banned, but concluded that “…we must take these measures.” Exactly why they must do so is not mentioned, however- leaving much room for fetid speculation.

This wretched and suicidal policy, if continued, will make internet ghettoes of entire countries. It will stymie growth, economic cooperation between the US and outside world, and above all utterly fail in the stated goal- that is, protecting American companies from internet security threats.

The astonishing stupidity of the commercial blacklisting policy – not to mention the sinister ramifications it has for the internet as the last bastion of freedom – make this undoubtedly one of the worst developments to afflict the internet in years. It reveals the worst side of the American mind, wracked by paranoia, positivistic, one-touch “problem-solving,” and a siege mentality driven by greed. If left unchecked, such tendencies will mean an encroaching Ice Age not just for the dinosaurs of defenseless countries like Macedonia, but for all other forms of virtual life as well. Selective blocking of the free flow of commerce and site visitation may only be the first of many “security” restrictions to come.