Police in Italy are investigating a Virtual burglary that occurred within the popular Facebook Game Pet Society.

Pet Society is a social pet simulation game from Playfish that allows players to decorate and furnish virtual houses and purchase virtual clothes for their virtual pets.

Paola Letizia of Palermo, Italy, stated in a report to police that somehow a hacker managed to clean out her virtual home within the game, stealing everything but her blue cat that lived there.

The thief stole the virtual furniture, virtual clothes and virtual art with which 44-year-old Letizia had furnished her seven room home with. The cost of the items are believed to have totaled $140.

“I don’t think it matters that the flat only exists in Facebook,” Letizia was reported to have told the Italian media, “It is real to me and I have suffered a real loss.”

Maybe Pet Society can charge an extra fee for placing virtual security guards outside these virtual houses.

Pieter Roor, 58. and his wife Heleen, 59, were arrested last September after a Dutch investigation on behalf of the US authorities for running a scam on the internet which was reported to have earned them hundreds of thousands of euro.

It is alleged that the couple scammed investors by offering enormous profits with very little investment. A number of scam websites have featured some of the schemes allegedly run by the couple.

These include the Oxford Savings Club, AceInvest, MiAmigo Services, AceXchange, We Let Your Money Grow, Dollar Dazzler, Petheldia, XWire, and the Happy Society.

The couple were indicted earlier this month three charges, including conspiracy to commit fraud. It is believed that they also operated their sham investment schemes in Britain and the Netherlands

A Dutch court will decide on Friday if the extradition is to go ahead.

A six week sentence was handed down to nineteen year old man in Liverpool.

Oliver Drage, 19 years old, had been arrested back in May 2009 when police had been investigating child sexual exploitation. Police seized his computer but were unable to access any of the data as it was encrypted with a 50 character key.

After failing to disclose the password in September he was sentenced to a six week sentence. Under the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000 it is an offence to not disclose a password when requested to do so by the courts. It was reported that Police will carry on trying to crack the password used to encrypt the data.

According to Detective Sgt Neil Fowler: “Drage was previously of good character so the immediate custodial sentence handed down by the judge in this case shows just how seriously the courts take this kind of offence.”

“Computer systems are constantly advancing and the legislation used here was specifically brought in to deal with those who are using the internet to commit crime.

“It sends a robust message out to those intent on trying to mask their online criminal activities that they will be taken before the courts with the ultimate sanction, as in this case, being a custodial sentence.”