Popular Internet scams of 2009

The Federal Bureau of Investigation released its another report on the top Internet scams of 2009.

"The figures contained in [the FBI's] report indicate that criminals are continuing to take full advantage of the anonymity afforded them by the Internet. They are also developing increasingly sophisticated means of defrauding unsuspecting consumers. Internet crime is evolving in ways we couldn't have imagined just five years ago," said National White Collar Crime Center Director Donald Brackman in the report. Annual crime complaints reported to Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3) have increased 667.8% between 2001 and 2009.

According to the FBI and the IC3 Web site, the "popular scam trends for 2009" included hitman scams, astrological reading frauds, economic scams, job site scams, and fake pop-up ads for antivirus software.