Cyber Crime

Crime  is  on  the  rise  just  about  everywhere  these  days,  but  nowhere  has  this  up  rise  in  crime  become  more  apparent  than  in  cyber  space.  Like  so  many  other  aspects  of  our  lives,  major  fraud  has  gone  high  tech.

The  FBI  estimates  that  businesses  alone  lose  an  upwards  of  $1.5  trillion  annually  as  a  direct  result  of  cyber  crimes.  The  number  of  these  crimes  has  tripled  in  the  past  two  years  and  the  numbers  continue  to  climb.  (O’Leary  &  O’Leary)  p. 287

Through  the  duration  of  this  essay  we  will  be  embarking  on  a  journey  into  the  dark  and  seedy  world  of  cyber  crime.  Within  this  text  you  will  find,  the  definition  of  cyber  crime,  the  most  typical  types  of  cyber  criminals,  as  well  as  the  most  common  forms  of  cyber  crime.

The  exact  definition  of  cyber  crime  is  still  evolving.  (  www.davislogic.com/cybercrime.htm  ).  Cyber  crime,  or  computer  crime,  is  an  extremely  broad  term.  This  term  is  most  commonly  used  to  describe  criminal  activity  committed  where  a  computer  or  network  is  the  source,  tool,  or  target  of  a  crime.  Like  traditional  crime,  cyber  crime  can  take  many  shapes  and  occur  at  any  time  or  any  place.

When  an  individual  is  the  main  target  of  cyber  crime,  the  computer  can  be  considered  a  tool  rather  than  the  target.  These  crimes  generally  involve  less  technical  expertise  as  the  damage  done  manifests  itself  in  the  real  world.  In  these  types  of  cases  the  damage  dealt  is  primarily  psychological.

By  now  many  of  us   are  all  too  familiar  with  spam.  Spam  or  spamming  refers  to  the  abuse  of  electronic  messaging  systems  to  send  unsolicited  bulk  messages indiscriminately.  While  the  most  widely  recognized  form  of  spam  is  e-mail  spam,  the  term  can  also  be  applied  to  similar  abuses  in  other  media.

Some  of  these  abuses  include;  instant  messaging  spam,  web  search  engine  spam,  spam  in  blogs,  wiki  spam,  mobile  phone  messaging  spam,  social  networking  spam,  as  well  as  internet  forum  spam. As  applied  to  email,  specific  anti-spam  laws  are  relatively  new,  however  limits  on  unsolicited  electronic  communications  have  existed  in  some  forms  for  some  time.

Another  common  crime  plauging  cyber  space  is  identity  theft.  Internet  identity  theft  is  different  from  common  identity  theft  in  a  few  different  ways.  Common  identity  theft  is  different  from  common  identity  theft  takes  place  after  something  is  physically  stolen  from you  like  a  wallet  containing  credit  cards  and  a  driver’s  license  or  an  un-shredded  credit  card  statement from  your  garbage  bin.

The  thief  would  take  these  stolen  articles  and  use  them  to  make  a  fraudulent  purchase  or  something  of  that   nature. Internet  identity  theft  can  be  much  more  devastating  than  conventional  identity  theft  at  times  due  to  the  fact  that  most  victims  of  internet  identity  theft  are  completely  unaware  that  anything  has  been  stolen  from  them  until  it  is  far  too  late.                                                                                                                         Gone  are  the  days  when  we  had  to  step  outside  to  purchase  our  groceries,  book  flights,  and  vacations,  or  simply  transfer  money  between  bank  accounts.

Today,  we  can  simply  grab  our  checkbooks,  debit  cards  or  credit  cards,  sit  down  at  a  computer  in  the  comfort  and  safety  of  our  home,  and  complete  these  transactions  with passwords  and  PIN  numbers.

Thanks  to  advances  in  technology,  the  types of  transactions  we  can  now  complete  online  are  virtually  endless.  Unfortunately,  the  increase  in  online transactions  has  been  accompanied  by  an  increase  in  online  identity  theft.  Fraudulent  access  to  personal information  over  the  internet  is  increasingly  prevalent  and  sophisticated.

Two  forms  of   identity  theft  are  at  the  forefront  of  this  internet  piracy are  phishing  and  pharming.   Both  pharming  and  phishing  are  methods  used  to  steal  personal  information  from  unsuspecting  people  over  the  internet.  Phishing  typically  involves  fraudulent  bulk  email  messages  that  guide  recipients  to  (legitimate  looking)  fake  web  sites  and  try  to get  them  to  supply  personal  information  like  account  passwords.  Pharming  is  in  many  ways  similar  to  phishing.

Pharmers  also  send  emails.  The  consumer,  however,  can  be  duped  by  the  pharmer  without  even opening  an  email  attachment.  The  consumer  compromises  his  personal  financial  information  simply  by opening  the  email  message.

The  pharming  email  message  contains  a  virus  that  installs  a  small  software  program  on  the  end  user’s  computer.  Subsequently,  when  the  consumer  tries  to visit  an  official  web  site,  the  pharmer’s  software  program  redirects  the  browser  to  the  pharmer’s  fake  version  of  the  web  site.  This  allows  the  pharmer  to  capture  the  personal  financial  information that  the  consumer  enters  into  the  counterfeit  web  site,  and  the  consumer’s  account  is  again  compromised.

The  latest  form  of  pharming  does  not  require  email  at  all.  Password  stealing  Trojan  horses  can  attack  through  Microsoft  Messenger  where  key loggers  are  run.  Key loggers  are  viruses  that  track  a  user’s  keystrokes  on  legitimate  sites  and  steal  passwords,  allowing  a  thief  to  have  access  to  a  consumer’s  password  for  future  fraudulent  transactions.

The  most  common  blunder  people  make  when  the  topic  of  a  computer  virus  arises  is  to  refer  to  a worm  or  Trojan  horse  as  a  virus.  While  the  words  Trojan,  worm  and  virus  are  often  used  interchangeably,  they  are  not  exactly  the  same.

 Viruses,  worms  and  Trojan  horses  are  all  malicious  programs that  can  cause  damage  to  your  computer,  but  there  are  differences  among  the  three,  and  knowing  those  differences  can  help  you  to  better  protect  your  computer  from  their  often  damaging  effects.

A  computer  virus  attaches  itself  to  a  program  or  file  enabling  it  to  spread  from  one  computer  to another,  leaving  infections  as  it  travels.  Like  a  human  virus,  a  computer  virus  can  range  in  severity. Some  viruses  may  cause  only  mildly  annoying  effects  while  others  can  damage  your  hardware,  software  or  files.

Almost  all  viruses  are  attached  to  an  executable  file,  which  means  the  virus  may  exist  on  your computer,  however,  it  may  not  actually  infect  your  computer  unless  you  run  or  open  the  malicious  program.

 It  is  important  to  note  that  a  virus  cannot  be  spread  without  human  action,  such  as  running an  infected  program  in  order  to  keep  it  going.  People  continue  the  spread  of  a  computer  virus,  mostly unknowingly,  by  sharing  infecting  files  or  sending emails  viruses  as  attachments  in  the  email.

In  summary,  the  same  types  of  fraud  schemes  that  have  victimized  consumers  and  investors  for  many years  before  the  creation  of  the  internet  are  now  appearing  online.

 In  the  process,  they  not  only  cause  harm  to  consumers  and  investors,  but  also  undermine  consumer  confidence  in  legitimate  e-commerce  and  the  internet.

People  who  commit  cyber  crime  are  cyber  criminals.  Like  cyber  crime,  cyber  criminals  can  take  many  forms.  These  criminals  are  typically  terrorists,  child  predators,  members  of  organized  crime,  employees,  outside  users,  hackers  and  crackers.

  It  is  important  to  point  out  the  difference  between  hackers  and  crackers.  Hackers  are  individuals  who  gain  unauthorized  access  to  a  computer  system  simply  for  the  thrill of  it.  Crackers  do  the  same  thing,  but  for  malicious  purposes.

Computer  hacking  is  most  common  among  teenagers  and  young  adults,  although  there  are  many older  hackers  as  well.  Many  hackers  are  true  technology  buffs  who  enjoy  learning  more  about  how computers  work  and  consider  computer  hacking  an  art  form.  They  often  enjoy  programming  and  have expert  level  skills  in  one  particular  program.

For  these  individuals,  computer  hacking  is  a  real  life  application  of  their  problem  solving  skills.  It  is  perceived  as  a  chance  to  demonstrate,  or  showcase  their abilities,  and  talents,  and  not  an  opportunity  to  harm  others.

Cracking  is  the  act  of  breaking  into  a  computer  system,  often  on  a  network.  Contrary  to  popular  belief,  crackers  are  hardly  mediocre  hackers.   Computer  hackers  were  early  pioneers  of  computing.  These  early  pioneers  were  frantically  dedicated  to  inventing  and  exploring  how  things  worked.  As  a  part  of  the  sixties  generation,  these  hackers  were  also  prone  toward  being  anti-establishment  and  somewhat  disrespectful  towards  property  rights.

Eventually  a  pair  of  these  hackers,  Steve  Wozniak  and  Steven  Jobs,  hacked  together  the  first  commercially  successful  personal  computer,  the  Apple.  The  sixties  generation  hackers  flooded  this  new  industry  and  many  quickly  attained  positions  of  wealth  and  authority  creating  the  information  communications  ecology  that  dominates  Western  life.  Meanwhile,  two  things  happened.

1.       A  new  generation  of  hackers  emerged.

2.      The  world  economic  and  social  order  went  completely  digital,  and  so  crime  as  we  know  it  went  digital  as  well.

It  is  somewhere  at  the  interstices  of  the  new  generation  of  alienated  young  hackers  ( they  sometimes  refer  to  themselves  as  “cyberpunks” )  and  the  world  of  sometimes  organized  crime  that  we  locate the  concept  of  the  cracker.  The  term  is,  to  some  degree,  an  attempt  by  the  now  established  older-generation  hackers  to  separate  themselves  from  computer  crime.

The  debate  still  rages  as  to  what  constitutes  the  difference  between  hacking  and  cracking.  Some  say  that  cracking  represents  any  and  all forms  of  rule  breaking  and  illegal  activity  using  a  computer.  Others  would  define  cracking  only  as  particularly  destructive  criminal  acts.

 Others  would  claim  that  the  early  hackers  were  explicitly  anarchistic  and  that  acts  of  willful  destruction  against  “the  system”  have  a  place  in  the  hacker  ethos,  and  that  therefore  the  term  cracker  is  unnecessary  and  insulting.

This  concludes  our  journey  into  the  world  of  cyber  crime.  Through  the  course  of  our  journey  we  have  successfully  defined  cyber  crime,  identified  typical  cyber  criminals,  and  discussed  some  of   the  most  common  forms  of  cyber  crime.

The  effects  of  cyber  crime  are  far  reaching.  It  would  be  a  difficult  task  to  find  someone  who  has  never  been  affected  by  malicious  internet  activity,  or  who  does  not at  the  very  least  know  someone  who  has  been  negatively  impacted  by  cyber  criminals.

 Advances  in internet  technology  and  services  continue  to  open  up  innumerable  opportunities  for  learning,  networking and  increasing  productivity.  However,  malware  authors,  spammers  and  phishers  are  also  rapidly  adopting  new  and  varied  attack  vectors.

If  the  internet  is  to  become  a  safer  place,  it  is  imperative  to  understand  the  trends  and  developments  taking  place  in  the  internet  threat  landscape  and  maintain  online security  practices.  Internet  threats  continue  to  increase  in  volume  and  severity.

It  is  important  that  computer  users  are  on  guard  in  order  to  make  themselves  less  vulnerable  to  risks  and  threats.  Staying on  top  of  the  trends  and  developments  taking  place  in  online  security  is  critical  for  both  industry  researchers  and  all  computer  users  alike.

 References

     O’Leary,  T. J. ,  &  O’Leary  L.  I.  (  2008  ) .  Computing  essentials  introductory  2008.

                  New  York:  The  McGraw-Hill  Companies.

     Cyber  Crime.  (  2008  ) .  Types  of  cyber  crime.  Retrieved  September  27th  ,  2008 ,

                  From  http://www.davislogic.com/cybercrime.htm

The internet has put the world literally at anyone’s fingertips with a vast quantity of information is a mouse-click away. Information that was once only available in obscure reference libraries or card catalogs can be accessed by everyone. Unfortunately the internet is an equal opportunity tool, and those with virtuous as well as nefarious intentions can use this open resource to further their efforts to levels heretofore unheard of. The internet is also soapbox for free speech that epitomizes the intentions of the founding fathers to allow everyone the same opportunity to have their opinions aired.

There is a line that often blurs between legitimate and illegal behavior, when does harsh criticism become bullying, when does an expression of affection become harassment and how do the authorities differentiate between someone looking up an old classmate for rekindle a friendship and stalking a former girlfriend that spurned their overtures. The constitutional protections of free speech and requirements of specificity of regulations make the criminalization of inappropriate behavior.

CAUSES OF CYBER – CRIME

There are many reasons why cyber-criminals commit cyber-crime, chief among them are these three listed below:

Cyber-crimes can be committed for the sake of recognition. This is basically committed by youngsters who want to be noticed and feel among the group of the big and tough guys in the society. They do not mean to hurt anyone in particular; they fall into the category of the Idealists; who just want to be in spotlight. Another cause of cyber-crime is to make quick
money. This group is greed motivated and is career criminals, who tamper with data on the net or system especially, e-commerce, e-banking data information with the sole aim of committing fraud and swindling money off unsuspecting customers.

Thirdly, cyber-crime can be committed to fight a cause one thinks he believes in; to cause threat and most often damages that affect the recipients adversely. This is the most dangerous of all the causes of cyber-crime. Those involve believe that they are fighting a just cause and so do not mind who or what they destroy in their quest to get their goals achieved. These are the cyber-terrorists.

HOW TO ERADICATE CYBER – CRIME

Research has shown that no law can be put in place to effectively eradicate the scourge of cyber-crime. Attempts have been made locally and internationally, but these laws still have shot-comings. What constitutes a crime in a country may not in another, so this has always made it easy for cyber criminals to go free after being caught.

These challenges notwithstanding, governments should in the case of the idealists, fight them through education not law. It has been proven that they help big companies and government see security holes which career criminals or even cyber-terrorist could use to attack them in future. Most often, companies engage them as consultants to help them build solid security for their systems and data.

“The Idealists often help the society: through their highly mediatised and individually harmless actions, they help important organizations to discover their high-tech security holes….”# The enforcement of law on them can only trigger trouble, because they would not stop but would want to defy the law. “ Moreover, if the goal of the cyber-crime legislation is to eradicate cyber-crime, it mint well eradicate instead a whole new culture, in education is a much better way to prevent their actions.

Another means of eradicating cyber-crime is to harmonize international cooperation and law, this goes for the greed motivated and cyber-terrorists. They can not be fought by education, because they are already established criminals, so they can not behave. The only appropriate way to fight them is by enacting new laws, harmonize international legislations and encourage coordination and cooperation between national law enforcement agencies.

WHO ARE INVOLVED:

Those involved in committing cyber-crimes are in three categories and they are: THE IDEALISTS (Teenager). They are usually not highly trained or skilful, but youngsters between the ages of 13 – 26 who seek social recognition. They want to be in the spotlight of the media. Their actions are globally damageable but individually negligible. “Like denying a lot of important e-commerce servers in February, 2000 is said to have caused high damages to these companies.”# Most often they attack systems with viruses they created; their actual harm to each individual is relatively negligible. By the age of 26 to 26 when they have matured and understood the weight of their actions, they lose interest and stop.

THE GREED – MOTIVATED (Career Criminals).

This type of cyber-criminals is dangerous because they are usually unscrupulous and are ready to commit any type of crime, as long as it brings money to them. “They started the child pornography often called cyber-pornography which englobes legal and illegal pornography on the internet.”# They are usually very smart and organized and they know how to escape the law enforcement agencies. These cyber-criminals are committing grievous crimes and damages and their unscrupulousness, particularly in child-pornography and cyber-gambling is a serious threat to the society.

Example to show how serious a threat they pose to the society is “the victim of the European bank of Antigua are said to have lost more than $10million”# “…theft of valuable trade secrets: the source code of the popular micro-soft windows exploration system by a Russian based hacker could be extremely dangerous… the hackers could use the code to break all firewalls and penetrated remotely every computer equipped with windows were confirmed. Another usage could be the selling of the code to competitors.”#

THE CYBER – TERRORISTS. They are the newest and most dangerous group. Their primary motive is not just money but also a specific cause they defend. They usually engage in sending threat mails, destroying data stored in mainly government information systems just to score their point. The threat of cyber-terrorism can be compared to those of nuclear, bacteriological or chemical weapon threats. This disheartening issue is that they have no state frontiers; can operate from any where in the world, and this makes it difficult for them to get caught. The most wanted cyber-terrorist is Osama Bin Laden who is said to “use steganography to hide secret messages within pictures, example, a picture of Aishwarya Rai hosted on the website could contain a hidden message to blow up a building.”# A surprising fact is that these hidden messages do not alter the shape, size or look of the original pictures in any way.

HOW TO DETECT A CRIMINAL MAIL

A criminal mail is usually sent to networks with the aim of either corrupting the system or committing fraud. The way to detect such mails is by putting security measures in place which would detect criminal patterns in the network. News Story by , of IDG News Service says that Unisys Suite has a system called the “Unisys Active Risk Monitoring System (ARMS) which helps banks and other organizations spot patterns of seemingly unrelated events that add up to criminal activity.”#

Actimize Technology Ltd based in New York has developed technology that enables organizations to do complex data mining and analysis on stored information and transaction data without needing to copy it to a separate data warehouse. “The actimize software runs on the Microsoft Corp. Windows NT or Windows 2002 platform and can be developed on standard server hardware with either four to eight processors, Katz said.”#

Eric J. Sinrod in his article ‘What’s Up With Government Data Mining’ states that the United States “Federal Government has been using data mining techniques for various purposes, from attempting to improve service to trying to detect terrorists patterns and activities.”# The most effective way to detect criminal mails is to provide security gadgets, educate employees on how to use them, and to be at alert for such mails, above all, making sure no security holes is left unattended to.

CONCLUSION

It has been deduced from this study that reliance on terrestrial laws is still an untested approach despite progress being made in many countries,
they still rely on standard terrestrial laws to prosecute cyber-crimes and these laws are archaic statutes that have been in existence before the coming of the cyberspace. Also weak penalties limit deterrence: countries with updated criminal statutes still have weak penalties on the criminal statutes; this cannot deter criminals from committing crimes that have large-scale economic and social effect on the society.

Also a global patchwork of laws creates little certainty; little consensus exist among countries regarding which crimes need to be legislated against. Self-protection remains the first line of defense and a model approach is needed by most countries; especially those in the developing world looking for a model to follow. They recognize the importance of outlawing malicious computer-related acts in a timely manner or in order to promote a secure environment for e-commerce.

Cyber-crime with its complexities has proven difficult to combat due to its nature. Extending the rule of law into the cyberspace is a critical step towards creating a trustworthy environment for people and businesses. Since the provision of such laws to effectively deter cyber-crime is still a work in progress, it becomes necessary for individuals and corporate bodies to fashion out ways of providing security for their systems and data.

To provide this self-protection, organizations should focus on implementing cyber-security plans addressing people, process and technology issues, more resources should be put in to educate employees of organizations on security practices, “develop thorough plans for handling sensitive data, records and transactions and incorporate robust security technology- -such as firewalls, anti-virus software, intrusion detection tools and authentication services.

By way recommendations, these kinds of actions are suggested following the weak nature of global legal protection against cyber-crime:

•Firms should secure their network information. When organization provides security for their networks, it becomes possible to enforce property rights laws and punishment for whoever interferes with their property.

•Laws should apply to cyber-crime—National governments still are the major authority who can regulate criminal behavior in most places in the world. So a conscious effort by government to put laws in place to tackle cyber-crimes would be quite necessary.

•There should be a symbiotic relationship between the firms, government and civil society to strengthen legal frameworks for cyber-security. An act has to be crime in each jurisdiction before it can be prosecuted across a border. Nation must define cyber-crimes in similar manner, to enable them pass legislation that would fight cyber-crimes locally and internationally.

The full realization of the potential benefits brought by internet in the global community is greatly sabotaged by cyber crime activities. Cyber crime is increasingly becoming a major concern across the social, scientific, economic, and law enforcement fronts of the global community. Although the actual economic impact of cyber crimes is hard to qualify, it is estimated that the American nation looses over $100 million on internet related crimes every year. There are numerous types of cyber crimes (Laser, 2009).

These includes; identity theft, fraud, hacking, cyber terrorism, malicious computer programs, web posting of offensive materials, and drug trafficking among others. Due to the negative social and economic impact of cyber crime activities, governments and other stakeholders have engaged in a number of prevention measures. They encompass creation of public awareness to enable internet users to identify, report, and/or avoid being victims of such crimes (McDowell, 2008). Software scientists have also engaged in developing effective computer and network security software.

In addition to this, there are laws such as the Intellectual Property Law, Electronic Communication Privacy Law, and the 2001 Patriotic Act serve an important role in detecting and prosecuting cyber crime offenders. This essay seeks to discuss malicious computer programs (also know as malware) as a form of cyber crime, its characteristics and how it is prevented, detected, and/or prosecuted. Malicious computer programs are defined as coded programs, which serve either to corrupt the effective functioning of a computer system or lead to unwarranted remote accessing of information from a computer network (Loader, Douglas, & Thomas, 2000).

Viruses and worms are the most common types of malicious computer programs or software. Other malicious computer programs include spyware, and Trojan. They are codes which serve to compromise information stored in computer network devices. This type of malicious computer programs is commonly associated with infecting executable computer files and denial of network access by authorized users (Loader, Douglas, Thomas, 2000). Indeed, through extensive infecting of computer files, such codes are responsible for crashing of computer network devices.

Other common forms of malicious computer programs are deceptive Trojan horses, multi-purpose bots, and spyware programs. This is increasingly becoming a common cyber crime. Such programs are characterized by their ability to allow for the stealing of sensitive information from protected networks (Metropolitan Police, 2009). According to available information on these malicious computer programs, they can serve to aid a hacker in remotely accessing passwords and credit card details of network users without detection.

In addition, due to their sophisticated capability, such programs are employed for facilitating corrupting of confidential information stored institutional networks (Loader, Douglas, & Thomas, 2000). Such can also be used by terrorist groups to qualify the crucial information from their target government prior to attacks. There are numerous ways established for preventing malicious computer programs as a cyber crime activity. The most common measure is the creation of awareness among the general public and institutions on how to identify and mitigate being affected malicious computer programs (McDowell, 2008).

To realize this preventive measure, network software scientists have engaged in numerous researches; developing highly intelligent network security software. Indeed, some software such as antivirus are commonly found free in the internet. Such are serving the crucial purpose of mitigating infection of computer networks by malicious computer codes such as virus and worm among others. Still, this intelligent network security software brings with them the ability to identify and deny access of systems by unauthorized users (Lasar, 2009).

According to available research findings on the effectives of malicious computer programs, it is clearly established that some forms of these programs which are hard to control. In a move to protect the integrity of information technology in the society, it is a common practice for highly sensitive institutions to close down their networks upon realizing any errant behaviors. It is worth noting that such moves are instrumental in ensuring the continued illegal access of networks by hackers. This is usually followed by a change of the overall access security codes and other check requirements.

Indeed, for security codes of highly sensitive institutional networks, constant changing is recommended to reduce access chances by hackers. The process of detecting and prosecuting cyber crimes is quite complex. This has been closely attributed to the fact that offenders in these crimes employ high sophisticated technologies (Metropolitan Police, 2009). It is commonly claimed that thieves are usually ahead of technology. Another problem compromising the process of detecting and prosecuting malicious computer programs crime offenders is low rates of reporting such crimes by the victims (McDowell, 2008).

Such have also been associated by the failure of network company providers to cooperate with the law enforcement in identifying such incidences. Despite these drawbacks, the war on malicious computer programs as a cyber crime activity has employed a number of methods. First is the use of computer forensic investigation practices to qualify evidence of suspect malicious computer program offender (Lasar, 2009). This process involves technological analysis of collected data by forensic computer scientists.

It is to be underscored that according to existing laws such as the Intellectual Property Law and Electronic Communication Privacy Law provides for legal suits against the programmers and distributors of malicious computer programs (Loader, Douglas, Thomas, 2000). Another commonly used measure in detecting cyber crimes is the tapping of communication networks by law enforcement agents. Although this method has received heavy critics for interfering with the privacy and confidentiality of communication, it serves great purpose in mitigating unwarranted access of sensitive networks.

The Patriotic Act of 2001, which allows for government surveillance of the internet, is aimed at mitigating terrorist activities. According to the provisions of the Act, law enforcement is given legal authority to intercept internet communications by crime suspects. Another crucial provision of the Act is its mandatory dictate for network providers to cooperate with the law enforcement in identifying the original of a given communication of malicious programs. Based on this reason, the process of detecting malicious computer programs has significantly improved with the enforcement of the Patriotic Act.

Another measure of detecting cyber crime activities is the modern streamlining of the reporting and responsiveness practices in the law enforcement (McDowell, 2008). This encourages institutions and individual victims of malicious computer programs to report such incidences, thus enhancing the process of mitigating such criminal activities by the law enforcement agencies. In conclusion, the escalating problem of cyber crime activities is increasingly compromising the realization of the potential benefits brought internet technological advancements in the community.

Although all cyber crimes have negative social and economic impacts in the society, malicious computer programs are a real threat to the security of nations across the global. Such programs are evidently blamed for corrupting executable computer network file, crashing of network devices, denying access by authorized users, and allowing access of private information by hackers. Therefore, there is need for more consulted efforts by the computer security software scientists, law enforcement, and other stakeholders to engage in formulating effective measures of fighting cyber crime. References Lasar, M. (2009).

An introduction to the FBI’s anti-cyber crime network. Retrieved May 28, 2010, from http://arstechnica. com/web/news/2009/11/an-introduction-to-the-fbis-anti-cybercrime-network. ars Loader, B. , Douglas, T. , & Thomas, D. (2000). Cyber crime: Law Enforcement, Security, and Surveillance in the Information. New York: Routledge. McDowell, M. (2008). National Cyber Alert System. Retrieved May 28, 2010, from http://www. us-cert. gov/cas/tips/ST05-006. html Metropolitan Police. (2009). Trojan’ computer arrests. Retrieved May 28, 2010, from http://cms. met. police. uk/news/arrests_and_charges/trojan_computer_virus_arrests