The robber pepper-sprayed a guard outside the Bank of America in Monroe, Washington, grabbed a bag of cash from a Brinks truck, and . He then floated down to the Skykomish River where presumably he had a boat or a car or possibly a zeppelin stashed.
But that wasn't the genius part. Security guards couldn't pursue the robber because there were a dozen other people at the bank dressed exactly like him -- dust mask, safety goggles, work gloves, blue work shirt -- . They'd all been instructed to show up at the bank at 11 am dressed for a job that promised US$28.50 an hour.
So is this what Senator Ted Stevens meant when said the ? Maybe he just meant the Net is going down the tubes... like a bank robber down a river.
It was hardly the first time Craigslist has been used to mask a robbery. Last March, an Oregon home was ransacked after , to cover up a crime they'd already committed. There's at least . It's a long list.
Now the cops are hoping the bank robber left a trail of digital breadcrumbs behind. In this way this story is similar to last week's "citizen journalism" snafu, where , possibly to drive down Apple's stock price. Now the with an iReports user employing the handle "Johntw." Anybody out there know him?
Whether they'll have any luck finding these crooks depends on how digitally savvy they were. If the bad guys used proxy services to mask their IP addresses -- and those services don't maintain user logs -- it's unlikely law enforcement will get very far.
Does that mean online anonymity is a bad thing? Not necessarily. These same , where saying the wrong thing online can land you in prison -- or worse.
Where do you stand on the Internet anonymity debate? Should all of our online activities be traceable? E-mail me direct: cringe@infoworld.com.