The Romanian cyber-crime capital

A fascinating piece in Wired explores the Romanian town of Râmnicu Vâlcea, which has become one of the most important places in Europe when it comes to computer crime:

In fact, expensive cars choke the streets of Râmnicu Vâlcea's bustling city center-top-of-the-line BMWs, Audis, and Mercedes driven by twenty- and thirtysomething men sporting gold chains and fidgeting at red lights. I ask my cab driver if these men all have high-paying jobs, and he laughs. Then he holds up his hands, palms down, and wiggles his fingers as if typing on a keyboard. "They steal money on the Internet," he says.

Among law enforcement officials around the world, the city of 120,000 has a nickname: Hackerville. It's something of a misnomer; the town is indeed full of online crooks, but only a small percentage of them are actual hackers. Most specialize in ecommerce scams and malware attacks on businesses. According to authorities, these schemes have brought tens of millions of dollars into the area over the past decade, fueling the development of new apartment buildings, nightclubs, and shopping centers. Râmnicu Vâlcea is a town whose business is cybercrime, and business is booming.

The writer, Yudhijit Bhattacharjee, even goes so far as to meet 'Chita', one of the local kingpins:

The tattooed man leans toward me ominously. "Were you sent by Barack Obama?" he asks. I say that I wasn't, and everyone but me lights cigarettes. Marian, getting increasingly jumpy, demands to know my true agenda. Finally, I spell my name and tell him to search for my stories on his iPhone. He Googles me and shows the screen to his brother. Everybody relaxes a bit, and I silently give thanks for wireless broadband.

Marian asks the young couple to translate for Chita, and they agree to stay. Chita has them tell me to stand, then he pats me down, asking if I'm wearing a wire.

"What do you say to the charges against you?" I ask.

"They are fake," Chita says, in English.

As often happens with a story such as this, the comments on the Wired page are full of interesting debate on whether it's fair and how well it represents the town and its people.