Internet Pharmacies Target Academics

The BBC reports today that a fake drug scam has hijacked some UK college websites.  Online searches for drugs such as Viagra, Cialis etc would give search results which included the websites of academic institutions.  When the user clicked on these sites they were instead taken to online "pharmacy" sites where they were offered the medicines they had originally searched for.

I (and many others) have blogged about internet pharmacies before, but this is a cunning new angle.  By routing the search through the psychologically safer ground of an academic website, the criminals may perhaps fool the unwary into assuming some kind of endorsement of the online pharmacy. 

Internet pharmacies, with very few exceptions (probably not enough for a tetrapod to run out of digits when counting them) are very risky and dangerous. Do not be fooled by the search route, logos, associations or any claimed endorsements. Check everything thoroughly. VIPPS  is one of the few reliable quality schemes.

If you are trying to get prescription medicine online without a prescription then try using breath mints instead - much cheaper, less toxic, and just as efficaceous as whatever turns up in the post from the internet harmacy ("p" deliberately omitted).

Google's VIPPS-Accreditation Requirement for Internet Pharmacy Advertisers

The US National Association of Boards of Pharmacy, as well as the Partnership for Safe Medicines and others, have welcomed Google's decision to require accreditation for internet pharmacies wishing to advertise on Google.

The VIPPS scheme for accreditation goes a long way to stamping out rogue pharmacies and Google's decision is a major step forward. It won't stop bogus phamacies appearing in search results, but it will stop them getting on the sponsored slots at the top and side of the screen.

My recent post on parallel universe issues applies here and we need to careful that criminals don't spoof the VIPPS online accreditation symbols. Nevertheless, this is a big step forward.