Causes of cybercrimes.

Causes of cybercrimes. A must know for today’s tech generation!

Yogda Kakirde:-

We are living in this era of internet and technology. We humans are fully dependent on it. Internet providers us everything just on the click of a button. We shop on internet, we connect with the world, we pay our bills, we get all sorts of information, we entertain ourselves on the internet and what not. So, basically, we are being dependent on it a little more every passing day. As it’s usage is increasing rapidly the world is coming closer. Rapid technological has created vast areas of opportunities for all the organizations and industries around the world. But these new development have also brought unprecedented threats which is popularly known as “cyber crimes.” The most simplest definition of a cybercrime would be, crimes happening online such as hacking, spamming, phishing etc. But have you ever wondered what are the causes for the happening of these cybercrimes? If we move into the dynamics of these crimes we will find that they can be categorised into two forms, the first one is where the computer is itself the target like hacking, virus attacks etc and the second category is where the computer is the weapon like cyber terrorism, IPR violation, pornography, crime against children etc. We you have observed these people committing cybercrimes known as cybercriminals are very intelligent, educated unlike normal criminals. To put this all in one word of I may say, cybercrime has converted itself into a industry as here the risk is comparatively low then the profits they make. The supply chain of tools, services, training required to support this industry is huge.

Now what are the probable causes of these crimes. Well, roughly what I have observed is that the causes can be of varied range s the crimes are but one element is common which is “motivation.” All these varied range of cybercrimes and their criminals are highly motivated though their motivation can differ. If we talk about crimes like identity theft, phishing and fraudulent money request attack they happen because the cyber criminals are economically motivated. Especially because of the danger or risk of the criminality is really very very less when you are hiding behind a network as compared to money related crimes happening outside the internet such as bank robbery. If we go by estimate it suggests that cybercrime targeting online banking alone pull nearly 700 million dollars per year globally. Next category of crimes on the internet includes identity theft, installation of virus, pornography. If we go into the physiology of the person committing these crimes then we’ll get to know that these crimes happen because cybercriminals are also humans. They indulge in these types of crimes because of their personal emotions and vendettas. Weather it is a disgruntled employee installing a virus in the computer office or a jealous boyfriend hacking girlfriend’s social media account or a desperate stalker leaking private pictures of his prey.

These crimes are essentially crimes of passion committed over the internet. Many of these crimes however, can have very serious impacts and can cause considerable mental damage on the victim. The next set of crimes we come across are the crimes which targets certain companies or industries. As, I have already mentioned cybercrimes have converted itself to an industry and the people of these industries are motivated by certain ideologies. For instance, if a company is doing well in the market and its profits are reaching heights then the the competitor of the company can indulge in these kinds of crimes to make the company’s position down. For example, After financial companies like Visa, MasterCard and PayPal refused to let account and card holders make contributions to the controversial non-profit WikiLeaks, the “hacktivist” group Anonymous coordinated a series of bot attacks on the companies’ servers, rendering them unreachable to Internet users. These kinds of attacks are conducted for perceived ethical, ideological or moral reasons, damaging or disabling computer equipment and networks to express grievances against individuals, corporations, organizations or even national governments. Also there are structural causes such as easy access to data due to which these crimes takes place.

Why more and more personal and sensitive information is stored online, neither computer security nor application like email filters have improved in terms of their coverage. Also one of the main reasons for the happening of these crimes is negligence which is a common human conduct.

There is this use possibility that while protecting the computer system we make negligence which provides cybercriminals the access and control over are computer systems. Thus, are the few basic causes which I have observed for the happening of these crimes.
There is this ease of entry into this industry of cybercrime because of big market opportunities and very less competition. In fact, there is very often collaboration and lose networks of cybercriminals who work together to improve their capability and skills to seek new opportunities.

The tools that are effective follow enforcement agencies are virtual releam. Technology and tactics of these criminals are changing faster then law enforcement can adopt them. The only way to deal with them is more stricter laws and faster implementation.