Anatomy of a software sales scam

A couple of days ago, Daniel Kennett of the KennettNet micro-ISV (in plain talk, a one-man software business) told me that a customer had fallen victim to a scam. She had purchased a copy of his application Music Rescue—a very popular utility for working with iPods—from a vendor but had not received a download or a licence. The vendor had charged her over three times the actual cost of the application, and seemingly disappeared; she approached KennettNet to try and get the licence she had paid for.

Talking to the developer and (via him) the victim, the story becomes more disturbing. The tale all starts when the victim was having trouble with her iPod and iTunes, and contacted Apple support. The support person apparently gave her an address from which to buy Music Rescue, which turned out to be the scammer’s address. Now it’s hard to know what she meant by that, perhaps the support person gave her a URL, or perhaps she was told a search term and accessed the malicious website via a search engine. It would be inappropriate to try and gauge the Apple support staff’s involvement without further details, except to say that the employee clearly didn’t direct her unambiguously to the real vendor’s website. For all we know, the “Apple” staffer she spoke to may not have been from Apple at all, and the scam may have started with a fake Apple support experience. It does seem more likely that she was talking to the real Apple and their staffer, in good faith or otherwise, gave her information that led to the fraudulent website.

The problem is that if you ask a security consultant for a solution to the problem of being scammed in online purchases, they will probably say “only buy software from trusted sources”. Well, this user clearly trusted Apple as a source, and clearly trusted that she was talking to Apple. She probably was, but still ended up the victim of a scam. Where does this leave the advice, and how can a micro-ISV ever sell software if we’re only to go to stores who’ve built up a reputation with us?

Interestingly the app store model, used on the iPhone and iPad, could offer a solution to these problems. By installing Apple as a gateway to app purchases, customers know (assuming they’ve got the correct app store) that they’re talking to Apple, that any purchase is backed by a real application and that Apple have gone to some (unknown) effort to ensure that the application sold is the same one the marketing page on the store claims will be provided. Such a model could prove a convenient and safe way for users to buy applications on other platforms, even were it not to be the exclusive entry point to the platform.

As a final note, I believe that KennettNet has taken appropriate steps to resolve the problem. As close as I can tell the scam website is operated out of the US, making any attempted legal action hard to pursue as the developer is based in the UK. Instead the micro-ISV has offered the victim a discounted licence and assistance in recovering the lost money from her credit card provider’s anti-fraud process. I’d like to thank Daniel for his information and help in preparing this article.