Internet Crime in the 21st Century
04/21/2009A recent article in the Washington Post reported that last year the 100 confirmed security breaches committed by cyber criminals included approximately 285 million consumer records, with more than nine out of ten of the compromised records associated with financial institutions. Those are some frightening numbers, considering the entire population of the United States including children is approximately 306 million. In today's world, where you can perform tasks of any nature online, such as buying groceries, ordering a pizza, and handle your finances, security is crucial to preventing the collapse of the Internet as a trusted vehicle for everyday tasks. However, the technology that we rely on rapidly changing, the face of Internet crime is also changing.
Rather than the traditional view of " organized crime," with corpulent men in pinstripe suits and facial hair, the stereotype is changing to accommodate pony-tailed guys in Lord of the Rings tee shirts. Most people have seen scam emails with the typical scenario: the sender of the email, usually Nigerian for some reason, recently inherited a large sum of money that he would like you to invest for him in a U.S. bank account. Although emails such as these are usually identified as spam by either the email server or the recipient of the message, some of the more authentic messages are paid heed with expensive consequences. This week 30-year-old Tuoyo Clement Nikaghanri, a Nigerian man in Australia, was sentenced to prison for conning four people out of a total of $132,400(AUD) through elaborate scams initiated over the Internet between 2004 and 2008. The emotional hook in scams such as these is significantly less complicated than the complex actions undertaken to steal banking information - the forged documents proving the offer to be real are more complicated. However, you can take comfort in knowing that these scams all have the same general appearance.
The security breaches mentioned in the Washington Post article were done in a much more calculated manner than a simple email blitz of direct contact between the scammer and the person in danger of being scammed. The people performing these scams are often members of cyber-crime groups that work together to collect credit card information from millions of people. Many of these cyber-crime groups are based in Russia and other Eastern European countries. One of the downsides of the Internet increasing opportunities for a global economy is the increased opportunity for organized crime on a global basis. Although there is not much the individual can do to prevent his information from being stolen from a database maintained by a retailer or banking institution (and most retailers and certainly all banking institutions hold data security as a top priority), you can and should practice financial circumspection, noting when charges appear in your banking statements that you did not authorize. When making transactions online, look for "https" at the beginning of the website's URL - that indicates that the site is secure and that your information will be safe. However, all systems can fail when put up against an organized cyber-crime entity, and reporting anything suspicious in your account to the retailer (if applicable) and your financial institution is the best thing you can do.
The Internet is a wonderful tool for communicating, learning, sharing, and performing day-to-day tasks. Just as there is crime in the real world, the façade of technological innovation does not make the Internet impervious to organized crime.
