It seems most efforts are being taken by the private companies who are affected by it. In the phishing and spamming arena you have Google doing a fairly sterling job of eliminating spam from most people's inboxes, and many banks and insurance companies have online crime investigation departments that try to crack down on phishing etc.
It is good to see the occasional prosecution for spam/scam/phishing but I don't think we see enough of them. How are you going to prosecute someone who you can trace to an IP in Eastern Europe, but which may just be a Tor exit node.
I think that higher reporting rates would be a good first step, and I'd implore anyone who has been targeted by these pricks to report it to the local authorities. The more details that can be collated, the easier it will become to follow the money.
I imagine a lot of people don't bother reporting because nothing happens. Spam filtering won't stop spammers. They need to be hit in the pocket. Here in Australia, I report Australian companies spamming me to the ACMA but can't imagine they ever do anything about it.
I get spam from Chinese businesses posting galleries of their products on Picasa (Google property) and then using share buttons to spam people. I mark it as spam in Gmail (Google property) every time, but still every Picasa email makes it through despite that consistent mix of Picasa template and Chinese characters.
It is good to see the occasional prosecution for spam/scam/phishing but I don't think we see enough of them. How are you going to prosecute someone who you can trace to an IP in Eastern Europe, but which may just be a Tor exit node.
I think that higher reporting rates would be a good first step, and I'd implore anyone who has been targeted by these pricks to report it to the local authorities. The more details that can be collated, the easier it will become to follow the money.