Crimes in Cyber-SpaceEssay Preview: Crimes in Cyber-SpaceReport this essayA computer crime is defined as, “Criminal activity directly related to the use of computers, specifically illegal trespass into the computer system or database of another, manipulation or theft of stored or on-line data, or sabotage of equipment and data.”2. This includes both crimes using computers and crimes against computers.
Cyber-criminals can generally be put into the following categories:Crackers: These individuals are intent on causing loss to satisfy some antisocial motives or just for fun. Many computer virus creators and distributors fall into this category.
Hackers: These individuals explore others computer systems for education, out of curiosity, or to compete with their peers. They may be attempting to gain the use of a more powerful computer, gain respect from fellow hackers, build a reputation, or gain acceptance as an expert without formal education.
Pranksters: These individuals perpetrate tricks on others. They generally do not intend any particular or long-lasting harm. A large portion is juvenile.
Career criminals: These individuals earn part or all of their income from crime, although they do not necessarily engage in crime as a full-time occupation. Some have a job, earn a little and steal a little, then move on to another job to repeat the process. In some cases they conspire with others or work within organized gangs such as the Mafia. The greatest organized crime threat comes from groups in Russia, Italy, and Asia. “The FBI reported in 1995 that there were more than 30 Russian gangs operating in the United States. According to the FBI, many of these unsavory alliances use advanced information technology and encrypted communications to elude capture.”4.
Malcontents, addicts, and irrational and incompetent people: “These individuals extend from the mentally ill to those addicted to drugs, alcohol, competition, or attention from others, to the criminally negligent. In general, they are the most difficult to describe and the most difficult to protect against. “Programmers in New Zealand, for example, were convicted of criminal negligence when they failed in their duty to inform the captain of an airliner that they had reprogrammed his navigation system. He flew the plane into a mountain in Antarctica that, according to his navigation computer, was not supposed to be there, killing 80 tourists.” 4.
Extreme Advocates: These individuals and groups have strong social, political, or religious views and are intent on changing conditions by engaging in crime. Their crimes usually involve violence against people or property and are calculated to achieve a high level of publicity to bring attention to the terrorists causes. “To date, terrorists have rarely engaged in cyber crime, although the Red Brigades in Europe came close by destroying more than 60 computer centers during the 1980s. Terrorist groups, especially the highly organized ones sponsored by rogue countries such as Libya and Iran, are likely to turn their attention to our fragile information, utility, and transportation infrastructures when their current methods lose their impact.”4. Such groups could plan an attack on a worldwide basis, using cryptography to communicate, and then carry out their acts through the Internet.
Access to computer systems can be gained in many different ways. The simplest of these is direct access. Being the programmer, developer or specialist working with the system puts you in control of how the computer or network functions. Access can also be gained through a method called cracking. Cracking is a method of finding and using somebody elses username and password. In order to crack a password, “you can make a good guess, try out a number of combinations, look for the combination (password) written someplace nearby orone might try to find an alternate way into the system, a back door” 5. Scanning is another way to “crack” information. Scanning is “[using] a computer program that automatically generates a sequence of phone numbers, credit card numbers, passwords or the like to try against a system entry test” 5.
There are ways around scanning, such as putting a limit of attempts one gets to enter the correct password in the system entry test would stop the program from trying over and over again. An additional way one might gain access in through piggybacking. Piggybacking is “getting into a secured area by slipping in right behind someone who is cleared for access [Piggybacking] can happen if the person using a terminal ahead of you did not log off properly, and her account is thus still active; you can go in” 5, basically it is using another persons access to as it were your own. The piggybacker then has access to all the past users files and can be destructive if they choose and wipe out the account.
There are many different types of computer crimes, but there are basically two main categories, crimes against computers and crimes using computers. “Crimes against computers are usually based on the destruction of hardware and software or the theft of computer technology.” 5. Many people get mad at computers for many reasons. Computers are based on human input, thus computers make mistakes. People sometimes take the anger that builds up, after a computer has made a number of mistakes, out on the actual hardware such as: a computer monitor, tower, keyboard, or mouse. Computer systems have been mutilated and destroyed to destroy data and records. This is not the best method of destroying computer data. Although the system as a whole might be devastated, the data can sometimes be restored through special techniques.
Crimes using computers are more prevalent. There are numerous crimes that can be committed using computer, but they are not new crimes. The crimes were already in practice before its invention but new technology makes them easier to commit and provides less of a chance of getting caught. Money is the root of a lot of crimes, for instance, embezzlement is “the act of stealing money that is entrusted to you” 2, or stealing from somebody that you work for. Banks are one of the best places to steal money from because, obviously, thats where a large portion of money can be found. A great deal of the money that a bank oversees is not physical cash; it is numbers in computers. Many different and ingenious ways have been developed by computer criminals to embezzle money. The simplest form is to electronically transfer funds from someones account into your own. The possibility of being caught doing this is very high
\4\ •
If the money in question is in a bank account, then it gives you your bank’s true name and/or your date of birth. You can then send money to a server. However, the bank doesn’t know your name, it uses personal phone numbers (and you might have a name which is not your own and is later revealed for tax purposes). Your IP address can then be used to send money to your computer (i.e., where a hacker takes your IP address and gives it to them. This includes paying you money, receiving the email or mailing you, and so on). It doesn’t stop at your actual money being sent and received. It doesn’t stop at email addresses but it is all there, including the details of how the money is actually being sent.
\4\”>\#\4\ /* A way to bypass the bank system and to be on your own. If your customer/customer account is in a secure location, they can also send money to your computer. In a bank account, they can send money via email. In this sense, the customer account is also a private, confidential account, but in a bank account an employee should be able to take on other assignments
\4\ •
What type of computers are used to conduct these acts? */\#\4\ “A number is an identifier of a bank or money institution. * Bank records, such as banknotes, are an identifier in the form of checks made by customers; in a bank account, a customer is the customer’s bank account number, the account number of the bank holding the note or investment account, the name of the investment account and even the account number of the individual who made it.
You can also send money through a credit card through a number, and vice versa. It’s much different compared to being recorded in a person’s name. */\#\4\ “The physical address of your account has no value unless you transfer funds through your debit account. It’s the physical address of the account that has no value, and that cannot be changed. Your computer and credit card do not have any value. But a credit card does when it doesn’t have you and it doesn’t have the actual user name and your account name as the account number.
\4\”>\#\4\ The person doing the sending will be your main customer.
\4\”>\#\4\ •
Consequently, most people probably think that this would be the quickest way to embezzle money. Many can embezzle over $$$$ in a minute and never do anything other than transfer money and they will all be on their phones and on their computer talking back and forth via their phones until you send them something in the mail. That has been done as far back as the late 1970s where cash transfer was legal since it was a legal service.
\4\”>\#\4\ How often banks send money in-house? On an average, the amount of time the person does this varies, but sometimes it all depends on the person’s income and the type of transaction that one is. Generally, when an applicant gets involved in banking, and this often results in bank money being sent through their bank account (with a short-term interest advantage over the more experienced bank), it becomes very difficult to pay the interest for that large sum. This is what bank money usually amounts