Cyber Crimes - Crimes by finger tips

Sanjenbam Jugeshwor Singh *

Cyber Crime or Computer oriented Crime is the crime that involved a computer and a networks. The computer may have been used in the commission of a crime or it may be the target.

Cybercrime can be defined as: Offences that are committed against individual or groups of individuals with a criminal motive to intentionally harm the reputation of the victim or cause physical or mental harm or loss to the victim directly or indirectly using modern telecommunication networks such as Internet (networks including chat rooms, e-mails, notice board and groups) and mobile phones (Bluetooth, SMS, MMS).

Cybercrime may threaten a person or a nation’s security and financial health. Issues surrounding these types of crimes have become high profile, particularly those surrounding hacking, copyright infringement, unwanted mass surveillance, sextortion, child pornography and child grooming.

There are also problem of privacy when confidential information is intercepted or disclosed lawfully or otherwise. Internationally both governmental and non-state actor engage in cybercrimes including espionage, financial theft and other cross-border crimes. Cybercrimes crossing international border and involving the actions of at least one nation state is sometimes referred to as Cyberwar fare.

A report sponsored by McAfee published in 2014 estimated that the annual damage to the Global economy was $445 billion. Approximately $1.5 billion was lost in 2012 to online credit and debit Card fraud in the US. In 2018 a study by Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) in Partnership with McAfee concludes that close to $600 billion, nearly 1% of global GDP is lost to Cybercrime each year.

Computer crime or cybercrime encompasses a broad range of activities. Any dishonest misrepresentation of fact intended to let another to do or refrain from doing something which cause loss is known as Computer Fraud. Other forms of fraud may be facilitates using computer system, including Bank fraud, Carding, identity theft, extortion and theft of classified information.

A variety of internet scams, many based on phishing and social Engineering target consumers and businesses. An act of terrorism committed through the use of cyberspace or computer resources is generally defined as Cyber terrorism. As such a simple propaganda piece in the Internet that there will be bomb attack during holidays can be considered as cyber terrorism.

Cyber extortion occurs when website- email server or computer system is subjected to or threatened with repeated denial of service or other attacks by malicious hackers. These hackers demand money in return for promising to stop the attack and offer protection.

Perpetrators typically use a distributed denial of service attack. However other cyber extortion techniques exist such as doxing extortion and bug poaching. Cyber warfare is not the least to mention. The U.S Dept. of Defense (DoD) notes that the cyberspace has emerged as a national level concern through several recent event of geostatic significance.

Among those are included the attack on Estonia’s infrastructures in 2007, allegedly by Russian hackers. Russian again allegedly conducted cyber-attacks, this time a coordinated and synchronized kinetic and non-kinetic campaign against Georgia.

These crimes are committed by a selected group of criminals. Unlike crimes using the computer as a tool, these crimes require the technical knowledge of the perpetrators. As such, as technology evolves, so too does the nature of the crime. These crimes are relatively new, having been in existence for only as long as computer have – which explains how unprepared society and the world in generals in combating these crimes.

There are numerous crime of this nature committed daily on the internet. Crimes that primarily target computer networks or devices includes Computer Viruses, denial of service attacks, malware (malicious code).

When the individual is the main target of cybercrime, the computer can be considered as the tool rather than the target. These crimes generally involve less technical expertise .Human weakness are generally exploited. The damage dealt is largely psychological and intangible, making legal action against the variants more difficult.

Crimes that use computer networks or devices to advance other end includes: fraud and identity theft, information warfare, phishing scams, spam (the unsolicited sending of bulk e-mail for commercial purposes).

The content of the websites and other electronic communication may be distasteful, obscene or offensive for a variety of reasons. Whereas content may be offensive in a non-specific way, harassment, direct obscenities and derogatory comments at specific individuals focusing for example on gender, race, religion, nationality, sexual orientation .

These offences occurs in the chat rooms through newsgroups and by sending hate-email to interested parties. Harassment on the internet also includes revenge porn. Dark net markets are used to buy and sell recreational drugs online. Some drug traffickers used encrypted messaging tools to communicate with drug mules.

As technology advances and more people rely on the internet to store sensitive information such as banking or credit cards information, criminals increasingly attempts to steal that information. Cybercrime is becoming more of threat to people across the world.

Raising a weakness about how information is being protected and the tactics criminals use to steal that information continue to gain in importance.