Crime In Cyberspace Research Articles

Criminal profiling and insider cyber crime

On a global scale, cyber crime has skyrocketed with the advancement of the electronic medium. While progress is being made in combating cyber crime (particularly with the Council of Europe's Convention on Cyber Crime), a large gap continues to exist in legislative compatibility across international borders. Often overlooked in regards to profiling is cyber crime. The idea that an individual committing crime in cyberspace can fit a certain outline (a profile) may seem far-fetched, but evidence suggests that certain distinguishing characteristics do regularly exist in cyber criminals. This can be particularly useful for companies (the most often hindered victims of cyber crime) attempting to do away with cyber criminals inside their own walls (the most common type of cyber criminals). Whether they are simply breaking company policy by browsing the Internet while on the clock or embezzling thousands of dollars through the company's network, insiders are a very real problem that companies spend millions of dollars annually to prevent. An accurate profile of an inside cyber criminal may help in identifying both prospectively and retrospectively.

Managers’ Organizational Values and Ethical Attitudes in the Direct Marketing Industry

Increased unethical practices (Rieck, 1998), cyberspace crimes (Rothfeder, 1996) , and security threats (Pfleeger, 1997) in the emerging Internet-based global economy persistently raise more public concerns regarding the business conduct of direct marketing (DM) organizations. Violation of citizens' privacy (Charters, 2002), deceptive or misleading product offers, unsolicited offers, telemarketing scams, unauthorized sharing of customer lists, cyberspace's ethical vulnerability, and the lack of privacy and security of customer databases (Culnane, 1993; Rothfeder, 1997) are among these fears. The question arises as to how the environment of an organization affects practices that could be interpreted as unethical or socially irrespon sible. This research project studies the effect of the organizational values on the ethical attitudes and practices of DM managers. A similar study was previously conducted on MIS professionals (Vitell and Davis, 1990). In some other studies (Howard, 1990; Vitell and Festervant, 1987; Kaku, 1997) , organizational values, as a normative environmental factor, were used as an independent variable in their relationship to the dependent variable, such as members' decision-making behavior. Finegan (2000)

Criminal Law in Cyberspace

Two of the most talked-about crimes of the year, the ILoveYou computer worm and the denial of service attacks on Yahoo, eBay, and ETrade, suggest that a new form of crime is emerging: cybercrime. Thousands of these crimes occur each year, and the results are often catastrophic; in terms of economic damage, the ILoveYou worm may have been the most devastating crime in history, causing more than $11 billion in losses. This paper asks how cybercrime is best deterred. It identifies five constraints on crime - legal sanctions, monetary perpetration cost, social norms, architecture, and physical risks - and explains how each of these constraints may be reduced by committing crime in cyberspace. The ease of cybercrime risks negative substitution effects, as offenders move away from realspace and look towards the Net. Because cybercrime requires fewer resources and less investment to cause a given level of harm, the law might want to use approaches that differ somewhat from those in realspace. In part, this is so because computers provide a cheaper means to perpetrate crime. Criminal law must be concerned not only with punishing crime ex post, but with creating ex ante barriers to inexpensive ways of carrying out criminal activity. For example, if computers serve as substitutes for conspirators, then law might develop doctrines that treat computers as quasi-conspirators and establish inchoate liability. Some government barriers, however, will create dead-weight losses. For example, encryption has the potential to further massive terrorism (which leads many in the law enforcement community to advocate its criminalization) but also the potential to facilitate greater security in communication and encourage freedom (which leads many others to push for unfettered access to the technology). To help solve such problems, the paper advocates the use of sentencing enhancements as tools that surgically target bad acts. Sentencing enhancements have received relatively little attention in the academic literature; this Article attempts to fill that gap. Cyberspace also adds additional parties to the traditional perpetrator-victim scenario of crime. In particular, much cybercrime is carried out through the use of Internet Service Providers. Law should impose modest responsibilities on third parties because doing so promotes cost deterrence and capitalizes on what Reinier Kraakman has called gatekeeper liability. Third parties can develop ways to make crime more expensive, and may be able to do so in ways that the government cannot always directly accomplish, such as cost effective regulation of the architecture of the Net. The same logic sometimes applies to victims of cybercrime; law can develop mechanisms to encourage optimal victim behavior as well. Burden-shifting must not, however, sacrifice the value of interconnectivity and network effects.

Criminal Law in Cyberspace

Two of the most talked-about crimes of the year, the ILoveYou computer worm and the denial of service attacks on Yahoo, eBay, and ETrade, suggest that a new form of crime is emerging: cybercrime. Thousands of these crimes occur each year, and the results are often catastrophic; in terms of economic damage, the ILoveYou worm may have been the most devastating crime in history, causing more than $11 billion in losses. This paper asks how cybercrime is best deterred. It identifies five constraints on crime - legal sanctions, monetary perpetration cost, social norms, architecture, and physical risks - and explains how each of these constraints may be reduced by committing crime in cyberspace. The ease of cybercrime risks negative substitution effects, as offenders move away from realspace and look towards the Net. Because cybercrime requires fewer resources and less investment to cause a given level of harm, the law might want to use approaches that differ somewhat from those in realspace. In part, this is so because computers provide a cheaper means to perpetrate crime. Criminal law must be concerned not only with punishing crime ex post, but with creating ex ante barriers to inexpensive ways of carrying out criminal activity. For example, if computers serve as substitutes for conspirators, then law might develop doctrines that treat computers as quasi-conspirators and establish inchoate liability. Some government barriers, however, will create dead-weight losses. For example, encryption has the potential to further massive terrorism (which leads many in the law enforcement community to advocate its criminalization) but also the potential to facilitate greater security in communication and encourage freedom (which leads many others to push for unfettered access to the technology). To help solve such problems, the paper advocates the use of sentencing enhancements as tools that surgically target bad acts. Sentencing enhancements have received relatively little attention in the academic literature; this Article attempts to fill that gap. Cyberspace also adds additional parties to the traditional perpetrator-victim scenario of crime. In particular, much cybercrime is carried out through the use of Internet Service Providers. Law should impose modest responsibilities on third parties because doing so promotes cost deterrence and capitalizes on what Reinier Kraakman has called gatekeeper liability. Third parties can develop ways to make crime more expensive, and may be able to do so in ways that the government cannot always directly accomplish, such as cost effective regulation of the architecture of the Net. The same logic sometimes applies to victims of cybercrime; law can develop mechanisms to encourage optimal victim behavior as well. Burden-shifting must not, however, sacrifice the value of interconnectivity and network effects.

Surveillance as a Response to Crime in Cyberspace

The Council of Europe recently released the first draft of a proposed international convention concerning crime in cyberspace. The convention is made up of 29 draft articles. However, Articles 18 and 28 dealing with interception are blank apart from the statement 'under discussion'. One of the UK Government's responses to the perceived risk of criminal activity which either uses the Internet to facilitate or directly commit crime has been to promote interception and surveillance of communications over the Internet. To this end the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Bill (RIP Bill) contains proposals requiring Internet Service Providers to co-operate in the process of interception and surveillance. This paper looks at the interception/surveillance response in the context of other attempts to regulate crime in cyberspace. It is argued that conceptualising and segregating crime in cyberspace and using the designation 'cyber-crime' may have contributed to the introduction of surveillance measures. With reference to child pornography and the Internet as a short case study this paper explores the issues which should inform debate about regulation in this area.

Hate Crimes on the Internet

The Internet serves as a channel for electronic communication on an international level. While communication on the Internet has grown exponentially, the proliferation of crimes in cyberspace has become rampant. Hate crimes, in particular, have become increasingly prevalent on the Internet. In this past decade, the United States government has taken significant measures to combat the proliferation of hate crimes. This paper reports six cases of "cyberhate" crimes and emphasizes pertinent legal issues surrounding them. Current modes of intervention are discussed, ranging from local to national levels. The forensic psychiatrist may undertake a challenging role in the interpretation of the hateful criminal mind at the interface of psychiatry and the law.

Multimedia crime: Multimedia crime — Emergence, phenomena and legal questions of “metacomputer crime”

In recent months the volume of both journalistic reports and scientific articles have increased which deal with the subject ‘Crimes in Cyberspace’. The dissemination of pornographic or extremist material, as well as perpetration of fraud or the manipulation of texts via cyberspace, has developed a threatening dimension. Meanwhile the question of appropriate punishment of these acts has caused confusion among the prosecuting authorities as well as among the lawyers themselves. What is observed is the genesis of a new form of criminality which flourishes within the new communications medium of the digital network. This article discusses this new phenomenon. Guided by known cases, It presents the forms and the characteristics of the new criminal categories. The criminological research leads to the definition of a new form of criminality and to the question about which measures appear suitable to combat it.