2. WHAT IS COMPUTER CRIME ALL ABOUT?
Computer crime is any crime
committed with the help of a
computer. More specifically, it entails
an ever-growing series of categories
detailing specific wrongdoing
facilitated by a computer. With the
Internet attaining ever more critical
importance in society and our use of
computers evolving by the day,
computer crimes constitute some of
the most serious law enforcement
concerns in existence.
3. HISTORY OF COMPUTER CRIME
Every field of study and expertise develops a common
body of knowledge that distinguishes professionals from
amateurs. One element of that body of knowledge is a
shared history of significant events that have shaped the
development of the field. Newcomers to the field
benefit from learning the names and significant events
associated with their field so that they can understand
references from more senior people in the profession
and so that they can put new events and patterns into
perspective. This paper provides a brief overview of
some of the more famous (or notorious) cases of
computer crime (including those targeting computers
and those mediated through computers) of the last four
decades.
4. OVERVIEWS
•In the early decades of modern information
technology (IT), computer crimes were largely
committed by individual disgruntled and dishonest
employees.
•Physical damage to computer systems was a
prominent threat until the 1980s.
•Criminals often used authorized access to subvert
security systems as they modified data for financial
gain or destroyed data for revenge.
•Early attacks on telecommunications systems in the
1960s led to subversion of the long-distance phone
systems for amusement and for theft of services.
•As telecommunications technology spread
throughout the IT world, hobbyists with criminal
tendencies learned to penetrate systems and
networks.
•Programmers in the 1980s began writing malicious
software, including self-replicating programs, to
interfere with personal computers.
5. OVERVIEWS
• As the Internet increased access to
increasing numbers of systems worldwide,
criminals used unauthorized access to
poorly protected systems for vandalism,
political action and financial gain.
• As the 1990s progressed, financial crime
using penetration and subversion of
computer systems increased.
• The types of malware shifted during the
1990s, taking advantage of new
vulnerabilities and dying out as operating
systems were strengthened, only to
succumb to new attack vectors.
• Illegitimate applications of e-mail grew
rapidly from the mid-1990s onward,
generating torrents of unsolicited
commercial and fraudulent e-mail.
7. COMPUTER VIRUSES
A computer virus is a computer
program that can replicate
itself and spread from one
computer to another. The term
"virus" is also commonly, but
erroneously, used to refer to other
types of malware, including but not
limited
to adware and spyware programs
that do not have a reproductive
ability.
8. DENIAL - OF - SERVICE ATTACK
In computing, a denial-of-service
attack (DoS attack) or distributed
denial-of-service attack (DDoS attack)
is an attempt to make a machine or
network resource unavailable to its
intended users. Although the means
to carry out, motives for, and targets
of a DoS attack may vary, it generally
consists of the efforts of one or more
people to temporarily or indefinitely
interrupt or suspend services of
a host connected to the Internet.
9. MALWARES
Malware, short for malicious (or
malevolent) software, is software
used or created by attackers to
disrupt computer operation,
gather sensitive information, or
gain access to private computer
systems. It can appear in the form
of code, scripts, active content,
and other software. 'Malware' is a
general term used to refer to a
variety of forms of hostile or
intrusive software.
10. HOW TO PROTECT
YOURSELF
•The best known bit of advice is this: Never
open any attachment unless you know who
it's from and why they are sending it.
Refusing to open unsolicited e-mail of any
kind is the only sure-fire way to sidestep all
forms of trouble.
•Anti-virus software is crucial to preventing
virus attacks, but this strategy only works if
users update their software. Unfortunately,
'keeping it current' means updating it
weekly, at least but most products today
allow one to automate this process, but file
downloads can be large and slow.
11. HOW TO PROTECT
YOURSELF
•Common sense is another good weapon in the
fight against viruses. Be wary of opening any
email attachments, even from your friends,
especially if it has been forwarded to them. Set
up your anti-virus product so that it
automatically scans incoming e-mail and
avoiding e-mail software that allows automatic
launching of attachments.
•If all of this sounds like a lot of work, it is.
There is always a tradeoff between ease of use
and security but the extra time you spend
updating your anti-virus software now will save
you hours of time and buckets of frustration
later. If you don't keep it updated, you might
was well be completely unprotected.
12. PREVENTION OF
COMPUTER CRIMES
•Be sure do a full back up of your system on a regular
basis.
•Always use an anti-virus software program, one with
both an on-demand and an on-access scanner.
•Update the virus database in your anti-virus program
regularly.
•On a PC, change the CMOS setting of your boot up
process from booting first on the A drive (floppy) and then
on the C drive (hard drive) to just booting on the C drive.
•Don't allow your web browser to automatically run
programs, such as MS Word or other programs through its
e-mail program.
•Configure your web browsers to disable ActiveX, Java,
and JavaScript.
•Know that the only way a virus spreads is either by
launching an infected file or by booting an infected disk.
•Using an updated anti-virus program, scan all new
software for viruses before installing them on your hard
drive.
13. NET CRIME
Net crime refers to criminal
exploitation of the Internet.
Crime on the Net takes many
forms including hacking, viruses,
fraud, scams, money laundering,
industrial espionage, prostitution,
certain forms of gambling, drug use,
drug smuggling, suicide assistance,
defamatory allegations, cyber
stalking, cyber terrorism, actual
terrorism.
16. HACKING
Hacking can take several forms:
•Accessing - entering a network which is
intended to be private
•Defacing – changing the content of another
person’s Web site
•Hijacking – redirecting elsewhere anyone
trying to access a particular Web site
•Bombing – overwhelming a site with
countless messages to slow down or even
crash the server
•Denial of service – running a program
which sends thousands of requests to a site
simultaneously, frequently from more than
one source, so that the relevant server
slows down considerably or preferably
(from the point of view of the hacker)
crashes.
17. VIRUSES
Viruses, in the broadest sense, come in three
forms:
•Virus: This is a code that attaches itself to a
program in a computer and then reproduces
itself. It can erase files or lock up a system.
•Worm: This is similar to a virus but does not
attach itself to files or programs in a
computer. This leaves it free to spread
through a network on its own.
•Trojan horse: This is a program that
performs malicious actions while pretending
to do something else. It is similar to a virus
but does not try to reproduce itself.
18. PIRATING
Digital technology makes it very easy to
copy perfectly creative products such
as music or films and the Internet
provides a free and almost anonymous
means of transmitting or exchanging
this pirated material around the world.
The favored means of making such
material available is peer-to-peer file-
sharing applications. Originally the
main problem was with music in the
form of MP3 files exchanged through
sites such as Napster.
19. ILLEGAL TRADING
•Illegal trading on the Internet uses chat rooms,
bulletin boards, newsgroups and Web sites. The
arrangements can take various forms:
•A manufacturer with a legitimate order to
produce goods for a well-known company can
deliberately over-run the volume of the order
and sell the excessive items at lower prices in
other markets.
•The same goods - such as drugs or drinks - may
be sold in different markets at different prices in
a process known as 'parallel trading'.
•There is frequently straightforward
counterfeiting of well-known brand goods, with
40% of cigarettes and 10% of cosmetics and
perfumes sold world-wide believed to be fake.
20. CYBER TERRORISM
Cyber terrorism is the use
of Internet based attacks
in terrorist activities, including
acts of deliberate, large-scale
disruption of computer
networks, especially of
personal computers attached
to the Internet, by the means
of tools such as computer
viruses.
21. PORNOGRAPHY
Internet pornography is pornography that is
accessible over the Internet, primarily
via websites, peer-to-peer file sharing,
or Usenet newsgroups. While pornography
had been available over the Internet since the
1980s, it was the availability of widespread
public access to the World Wide Web in 1991
that led to an expansion of Internet
pornography.
The Internet enables people to access
pornography more or less anonymously and
to view it in the comfort and privacy of their
homes. It also allows access to pornography
by people whose access is otherwise
restricted for legal or social reasons, such as
children.
22. PREVENTION OF NET-CRIME
1. Install anti-spyware and antivirus
software.
2. Turn on your firewall.
3. Monitor the websites your children
go to.
4. Talk with your children about
online predators.
5. Go to the FBI website to learn
about internet scams.
6. Use secured websites when
purchasing items online and giving
credit card numbers.
7. Report suspected internet crimes.
23. CONCLUSION
While this document focuses on how to
investigate computer crime, how to properly extract
information, and understanding computer laws, the
hope is that readers will understand that even non-
computer crimes might still involve computer and
Internet resources. Overlooking this deprives law-
enforcement officers and agencies of a very
valuable investigative tool. After reading this
chapter, not only should you be aware of the scope
of computer crimes, you should also be aware that
even if a crime is not itself a computer crime, there
could be a computer or Internet element to the
crime. For example, a drug dealer might use e-mail
to arrange sales and purchases, a prostitute and
pimp might use Craigslist to facilitate their trade,
and a social-networking site can provide clues as to
the motive in a violent crime.