October 10 2003

Washington - United States authorities said on Thursday they had shut down an Internet scheme that took millions of dollars from immigrants on promises of help getting them US residency.

Officials from the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and the state department said a federal judge had issued a temporary restraining order against the operators of Internet sites that netted about $3-million (about R20-million) last year, the FTC said.

The operation consisted of two men who ran eight websites and did business as US Immigration Services (USAIS) and US Immigration Online (USIO), the FTC said.

The judge ordered the companies' assets frozen, and authorities in Florida arrested both men, an American citizen and an Egyptian national, as part of a parallel criminal probe, the agency said.

The two men could not be reached for comment.

FTC consumer protection chief Howard Beales said the websites led immigrants to believe they were affiliated with the US government and charged $40 to register them with a visa lottery program.

The companies did register customers, but the FTC charged they also misled immigrants, including telling them the service would ensure their application met government guidelines.

"These bogus operators not only picked consumers' pockets, they may have nixed their victims' only opportunity to enter this year's lottery," FTC consumer protection chief Howard Beales said at a news conference.

The Diversity Visa Lottery program makes visas available to people with the equivalent of a high school education or two or more years of work experience or training in an appropriate trade, who were born in countries with low rates of immigration to the United States.

The program receives about eight million applications a year and issues about 50 000 visas, the state department said.