Spanish PM to give his 'version' of slush fund story to Parliament

After massive demonstrations throughout Spain, together with pressure from the opposition party, Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy said on Monday that he will appear in the Spanish Parliament to give his side of the "slush fund" story.

 

Digital Journal reported on the story of Luis Bárcenas, former treasurer to the ruling Partido Popular party, being arrested and thrown in jail without bail on fraud charges. 

 

In court recently, Bárcenas admitted that he had made cash payments to the Spanish Prime Minister from a "slush fund." Bárcenas said that he handed €25,000 ($33,000) in 500 euro notes to Rajoy in March 2010.

 

Alfredo Pérez Rubalcaba, leader of the opposition PSOE party then called for the “immediate resignation” of Rajoy, and warned that his refusal to stand down was causing “incalculable damage to a country that is living through difficult moments.”

 

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18J - Spaniards in 30 cities across Spain protested against Government corruption and called for Rajoy's resignation.

As Digital Journal reported, on July 18, thousands of Spaniards hit the streets in 30 cities across Spain, protesting government corruption and calling for Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy and his government to resign. 

 

On Sunday the Spanish daily, El Mundo, published a poll which showed 89.1 percent of people surveyed thought Rajoy should answer allegations that he accepted secret payments from the PP. Only a small 2.4 percent of poll respondents didn't think Rajoy needed to offer up that explanation.

 

Rajoy has repeatedly denied any wrongdoing and has rejected calls for him to resign over the scandal.

 

However, it seems the pressure is now finally getting to Rajoy, and on Monday he said in a press conference that he would appear in the country's parliament to answer questions about the scandal involving alleged illegal funding of his party. Rajoy said that he would appear in Parliament to give his "version" of events relating to the slush fund scandal, under which former PP treasurer Luis Bárcenas alleges he operated a second set of books for the PP party over a period of many years.

 

However, Rajoy did not actually specify when he would appear in Parliament other than saying that this would take place either at the end of this month or next month.

 

No doubt protestations from the opposition party and the Spanish people will continue until such time as he does appear.

To the source: http://www.digitaljournal.com/article/354935

WhatsappSPY: Spanish man arrested for fake spy app on smartphones

A young Spanish man has been arrested for swindling thousands of euros with a fake spy app for accessing instant messaging conversations on smartphones for free. What victims got was something else entirely.

WhatsappSPY was supposed to be an application to install and use to view conversations from other users in real time. However, the fraud involved calling a phone number for an activation code, which actually subscribed the victim to a premium SMS service.

 

Rumors about the existence of the application had been going around the Internet for some time, saying that using the app, a user could access communications made by any person using a smartphone, with only a few simple steps. 

 

After a complaint was lodged by a social network, it was found that the main channel used to access victims for the fraud was by hacking users' profiles on the social media. 

 

The 23-year-old fraudster gained access to more than 11,000 users' profiles. Through these stolen accounts, mass spam messages were sent out to their contact lists to disseminate the information. All links included in the messages looked similar to a genuine social network, easily fooling people accessing them.

 

Users were automatically redirected to websites to facilitate downloading the program, although apparently once downloaded, the program asked them to introduce a mobile number to purchase an activation code. No activation code was ever received, but the owner of the particular mobile phone number was then subscribed to a premium SMS service, with costs of between €1.45 or €7.26 per call, depending on the operator.

 

Billed over a period of two months, profits to the fraudster could exceed €40,000. Researchers tracked the alleged architect of the fraud, a 23-year-old Spanish national, who was arrested by the National Police on July 20. A search of his home computer and four hard drives is being analyzed by specialists.

 

The operation was carried out by agents of the Technological Research Unit of the Judicial Police Commissioner-General in collaboration with the Police Headquarters of Murcia.

To the source: http://www.digitaljournal.com/article/354839