Forms Of Cybercrime And Online Fraud
Much of our lives revolve around screens and the internet. We spend at least two hours out of our days on our phones, computers, watching television, or playing on our iPads. Cybercrime is a form of crime that takes place on the internet and it can occur without anyone knowing that it is happening. What we do not realize about these wonderful devices is that they can be used against us, the society, the economy, and even the government through scams, fraud, identity theft and many other forms of cybercrime.
In “Introduction to Criminal Justice: Systems, Diversity, and Change, ” Rennison and Dodge (2018) define cybercrime as “a form of illegal activity using computer or computer networks as the primary method of commission”. Cybercrime comes in many forms, it can be; hacking, identity theft, scams, fraud, terrorism, extortion, and many more. What many people do not realize about cybercrime is that it can be a simple virus that is downloaded on to your computer through commercials or random tab openings. There are two forms of cybercrime that no one really sees as a crime, which is online bullying and online gambling, but they can be persecuted just the same as any other cybercrime. White collar crime and cybercrime sometimes tend to overlap, an example of this is security fraud. Security fraud is when an investment broker or stockbroker lies or gives out false information about their stock to their clients. Most of these cyber crimes are performed by hackers and some of these crimes are done by the use of an innocent person’s computer. Let’s address the main issue, and probably the vilest one; child pornography.
The progress that has been made by entrepreneurs and engineers with computers, and the internet has made many people’s lives easier, but, it also made it very difficult for the authorities to track down child pornography and help those children that are being forced into it. According to Thorn (2018), seventy-eight percent of child pornography displays children that are under the age of twelve years old. Thorn also defines child pornography as “any content that depicts sexually explicit activities involving a child”. The National Center of Missing and Exploited Children did research in 2013 and found the percentages for the abusers who create the content. It goes like this; eighteen percent is produced by parents or the guardians, twenty-five is made by the neighbors or family friends, and eighteen percent is from online enticements. In today’s world, much of child pornography is distributed through the use of the internet, private chats, and the dark web. There are many children that are being sold into sex trafficking through the use of technology, and this is a major issue for those that are both a part of cybercrime and child trafficking units. The website says that the emergence of these types of group chats and websites has created a community that “promoted communication between offenders, both normalizing their interest in children and desensitizing them to the physical and psychological damages inflicted on the children being exploited”. Because of these group chats predators can now communicate with each other which creates a close knit community that thinks that there is nothing wrong with their actions and normalizes the idea of child pornography.
The website “Media Smarts”, lists eight different forms of online scams, which are; auction fraud, email/IM Phishing Scams, Scareware, 419 Scams, Chain Letter Scams, Postal Forwarding Scams, “You Won Something” Scams, and lastly Gaming Console Threats. These scams are accomplished through the use of technology and the internet, most commonly through emails and pop-ups. IM Phishing Scam is defined as “when someone attempts to lure you into compromising your password information through emails and Web pages that appear to be legitimate but are not the real thing”. Scams such as these will request that you confirm your passwords or account numbers for certain things, which real banks will never do. One way to spot such scams is by the URL that they use. Banks usually have fairly short URL addresses so that their clients can remember them, whereas these online scammers will use longer URL’s that have random numbers and letters that are not related to the business they are trying to impersonate.
Another big give away is whether the websites’ address and URL begins with “https”. Scare-ware is a form of a virus that is downloaded on to your computer through random pop-ups. Usually, they will be pop-ups that warn computer users that there was a virus detected on their devices. In reality, these pop-ups will actually be the ones that download said viruses on to the computers if they are clicked on. Internet websites have created a system to block said pop-up; however, they do not work one hundred percent of the time. The “you won something” scam is when a person get an email that says that they have won either money or a new and fancy gadget. To receive said money or gadget, they ask for the person to provide personal information such as their bank account number and password. In the end, the person loses said shipping money and implicates their bank account information. Media Smart (n. d. ) offers a website that informs the users if an online offer is legitimate or not, that website is www. snopes. com. The Federal Bureau of Investigation has a website that addresses’ internet fraud. The FBI presents seven different forms of internet fraud on their website, some of which are; Data Breaching, Email Account Compromise (EAC), and Ransomware. Data breaching is when data and information are leaked from a secure forum onto an untrusted domain. Email account compromise (EAC) is when compromised emails are sent to big companies such as real estate agencies and law firms that, when opened, they download viruses or help the perpetrator hack the information of said computer or device. Ransomware is defined by the Federal Bureau as “A form of malware targeting both human and technical weaknesses in organizations and individual networks in an effort to deny the availability of critical data and/or systems” (2016). The perpetrator steals the victim’s information and “kidnaps” it until the victim gives them a ransom for the information that was stolen.
Another form of online fraud, which is discussed by Media Smart and is fairly self-explanatory; online auction fraud. In this form of fraud, you usually buy something online, using your credit or debit card, and then you never actually receive the item you bought or get your money back. Identity theft is also known as data theft because it is the personal information or data of the victim that is being stolen via that person’s electronic devices. Media Smart explains the way that perpetrators of such a crime can get your information; “thieves can obtain your information in several different ways, such as spreading viruses that install key loggers on your computer to discover your passwords, usernames, and credit card numbers”. Key loggers are viruses that are put onto computers through the use of pop-ups or spoof emails and then proceed to record every keystroke that a person makes on their device. Any form of site that people have used and allowed to save their username and password has the potential to be hacked. For example, in 2001 Sony was hacked and seventy-seven million of their PlayStation Network clients had their personal information stolen because they allowed the game to save their passwords and credit card information. However, identity theft goes far beyond stealing a person’s password or credit card information. Identity theft is when an individual’s whole identity is stolen and then used by the perpetrator. This means that the victim’s name, birth date, social security number, driver’s license, and passport information can all be stolen through the use of the internet. Some people have even been arrested for crimes that they did not commit simply because someone stole their identity and committed a crime under that particular victim’s name. Identity spoofing is closely related to identity theft; however, the only difference is that the perpetrator can also pretend to be the victim’s computer. This becomes a big problem if a person’s IP address is spoofed because then it would seem as if that person is doing the hacking and not the actual perpetrator. Besides child pornography, scams, fraud, and identity fraud another big part of cybercrime is hacking.
The issue with hacking is that it can be a part of all the forms of cybercrime previously mentioned. To commit crimes such as these, the perpetrator has to know his/her way around a computer and how to work viruses and firewalls. In the legal system, hackers are also known as malgrammers because they are “focused on destruction and mayhem through the use of viruses, Trojans, and worms”. A Trojan horse enables the hacker to use another person’s computer while being in a completely different location. Trojans is what hackers use to see everything that their victims are doing on their computers. This program logs keystrokes, allows the hacker to change files and browse through the victim’s pictures, screenshots, and even internet history. Worms on computers usually duplicate themselves over and over again, thus, “installing a backdoor on the victim’s computers”. Guru99 explains viruses as a “computer program that attaches itself to legitimate programs and files without the user’s consent”.
Cybercrime comes in many forms, but it always has one thing in common; the internet. The internet is used daily by millions of people through hundreds of different devices. Because it is so widespread and many people do not take the time to protect their devices, it is easy for hackers to gain access to people’s information. Cybercrime can happen without the victims even noticing it, and because of this, it is extremely difficult to fight. These devices that society holds so close and near to its hearts and eyes can be the things that expose them to the world, or be the downfall of the government.
