Various computer crimes – week 2 The rapid growth computer technology and internet in 20th century has increased our dependence on computers and networks, which also led to the growth in new form of crime –“cyber crime” throughout the world. In the first chapter of Principle of Cybercrime, Clough describers the various definitions of cybercrime. It can be defined as crime that committed through internet on a computer. It uses computer as a tool to commit the crime like child pornography, fraud, copyright, piracy and etc. However, computer can also be a targeted victim. There are various types of cyber crime such as hacking, spamming, malware, and etc. More serious, cybercrime can move on to cyberterrorism which the attack on a computer is political, national security, or religious based. In the cyberspace, I believe that cybercrime is same as traditional crime that has three major categories, which are crime against person, crime again poverty, and crime against government. First, cyber crime against person is included cyber-stalking, threat, harassment or even violence/murder in a cyberspace. However, how did law perceive these problems? The law has suggested physical ground. In the case of violence and murder in a gameworld is hard to justify if it can consider as offences since no one is physical injured. Second, cyber crime against poverty includes hacking, fraud, spamming, and spreading virus. Cyber criminals can transform harmful programmers to other computer through internet in order to access to personal information or modify data. Third and most serious type of cyber crimes is against government. Hacking into a government website such as military, energy, transportation, or other government operation with political motivation is cyber terrorism. After reading chapter 2 “Computer as Target”, I have learned four different type of malware. They are viruses and worms, trojans, bots, and spyware. However, as a regular user myself, virus and trojan are the malwares that I have experienced the most. Viruses and worms are software programmers that infect computer by reproducing itself and performing a programmed function. It had great harm to files or other programs on the computer. Sometimes people receive unusual emails from their friends, for example, a document or a link. Once you have opened the document or the link, will infect your computer and cause more emails to be sent. Next, trojans are most hacking method that I have seen. It appears to be a regular URL but may contain a hidden function. I have been received many spam email that contains trojan. Such as email from bank with modified link looks like official domain name. Once you have opened the link, the Trojan will installed on your computer automatically, and then will capture all your information such as password. I also believe cyber crimes are everywhere, it can happen to anyone in any time, and we also made a choice to put ourselves in a risk. When technology replaces the nature, we start to communicate with others through internet, also share files. The internet makes easier and faster to communicate and sharing files through people. This network is called “P2P”. Online music sharing or torrent downloading had great impact on music industry, and it is also against the law. Teenagers are at great a risk being target by installing or joining p2p network since they are lack of knowledge to understand what is right and wrong, or to define safe and unsafe. So to fight back cybercrime, individual first should be proactive. We should not reply strange e-mails from unknown person or even friends, and learn to report spam e-mails. We also need to be aware of uploading personal information on social networking site. Last, we could also use antivirus software to help fight against viruses and worms.
In conclusion, the world today is moving toward a point where are people use computer or even cellphones to get access in communication, entertaining, education, or even banking. People can simply pay their bill via their high-tech cellphones, instead of going to bank in person. As a result, I think the increasing dependence on computer networks in modern life had opened more and more opportunity for offenders in cyberworld.