thesis on computer crimes - English Essays

Computers are electronic devices designed to accept data, perform multiple tasks at high speed and display results. Over the last twenty years, a technological revolution has occurred, as computers are now an essential element of today's society. Large computers are used to track reservations for the airline industry, process billions of dollars for banks, manufacture products for industry, and conduct major transactions for businesses because more and more people now have computers at home and at the office. True that the computers have revolutionized the world in the way we do things but also has the crime committed with them attained monumental proportions and laws must be passed to address the increase in their numbers and types.
Definitions of computer crime have changed over the years as the users and misuse of computers have expanded into new areas. When computers were first introduced into businesses, computer crime was defined simply as a form of white-collar crime committed inside a computer system. Today the crimes have increased from sending viruses which are hidden codes put into a computer program, just to prove they can develop worms to destroy

computer companies to identity theft and fraud where millions of dollars are lost by individuals, companies and government. They are logic bombs implanted so that the perpetrators do not have to be present physically. Today computer crimes take on many forms. Swindling or stealing of money is one of the most common computer crime, an example of this kind of crime is the “Well Fargo Bank” that discovered an employee was using the banks computer to embezzle $21.3 million, it is the largest U.S. electronic bank fraud on record. These crimes are increasing due principally to society's declining ethical standards more than any economic need.
The profile of today's non-professional thieves cuts across boundaries of race, age groups and economic strata. Computer criminals tend to be relatively honest and in a position of trust: few would do anything to harm another human, and most do not consider their crime truly dishonest. Computer Criminals range between the ages of 14-30 yrs; they are usually bright, eager, highly motivated, adventurous and willing to accept technical challenges. It is tempting to liken computer criminals to other criminals, ascribing characteristics somehow different from 'normal' individuals, but that is not the case because I believe that the computer criminal often marches to the same drum as the potential victim but follows an unanticipated path. There is no actual profile of a computer criminal because they range from young teens to elders, from black to white, from short to tall. According to experts, gender is the only bias, as most are males while women act as accomplices, though of late they are becoming more aggressive.
Business organizations dealing with processing information wish that the computer security nightmare would vanish like a fairy tale. Information processing organizations accounted for $33 billion in services in 1983, and in 1988 accounted to be $88 billion. All this information is vulnerable to greedy employees, nosy-teenagers and general carelessness, yet no one knows whether the sea of computer

crimes is only as big as the Gulf of Mexico or as huge as the North Atlantic. Vulnerability is likely to increase in the future and by the turn of the Century, nearly all of the software to run computers could be bought from street vendors rather than being developed and procured under strict and standardized process. .
On print and electronic media, a new mythology is gaining a very fast popularity in which computer criminals are the “Butch Cassidy” of the electronic age. These true tales of computer capers are far from being futuristic fantasies; in fact, scores of real life cases inspire them. These crimes are not just crimes against the computer, but theft of money, information, software, benefits, welfare and many more. With the average damage from a computer crime amounting to about $.5 million, sophisticated computer crimes can ruin any industry, albeit nations.
Credit Card frauds are also a type of computer crime. This scares many people and for good reasons because their credit history is ruined by identity theft. Identity thieves use computer to access credit databases and illegally obtain the credit history of the institution into which they hack. They used names and credit information from the database to apply for credit cards. Recently a hacker who was caught used a neighbor’s information to apply for various Master and Visa Cards and he used the cards to issue himself at least $40,000 in cash from a number of automatic teller machines. He was caught once but was only withdrawing $200 which was considered a minor larceny and they couldn't prove that he was responsible for the crime so he was only put on probation. His defense was “I was 17 and I needed money and the people in the underground taught me many things. I would not go back and not do what I did but I would try not to be caught next time. I am the leader of HTH (High Tech Hoods) and we are currently devising other ways to make money. If it weren't for my computer, my life would be nothing like it is today”. He got away because because of lack of strict laws to deal with such crimes. Who bears the cost of the loss his victims have to face? In my opinion, the best compensation would have been for the law to at least properly deal with the perpetrator.
Finally, one of the computer crimes involves theft of computer time. Most of us do not recognize this as a crime, but everyday people use computers excessively and improperly. For example, at most colleges’ computer time is thought of as free- good students and faculty often compile mailing lists for their churches or

organizations that might be written off as good public relations but, the use of these computers for private consulting projects without payment to the university is clearly improper. This is also similar in business organizations as the management board often looks the other way when employees play computer games or generate a Snoopy calendar. However, if this becomes excessive the employees are stealing work time and computers can process only so many tasks at once. Although considered less severe than other computer crimes such activities can represent a major business loss. While most attention is paid to the criminal aspects of computer abuses, it is likely that civil action will have an equally important effect on long-term security problems. The issues of computer crimes draw attention to the civil or liability aspects in computing environments because In the future, there may tend to be more individual and class action suits.
Computer crimes are fast growing because the evolution of technology is fast, but the evolution of law is slow. While a variety of states and nations have passed legislations aimed at combating computer crime, the situation is far from being resolved. Controls can be instituted within industries to prevent such crimes. Protective measures such as hardware identification, access controls software development and disconnecting critical bank applications should be devised. However, computers do not commit crimes; people do. The perpetrator's best advantage is ignorance on the part of those protecting the system because the criminals are usually one-step ahead. Computer crime is a worldwide phenomenon and everybody must be concerned with solutions to combat the crimes and the perpetrators. Imagine if records from banks, airlines, aircrafts, hospitals etc are destroyed, the world will be doomed. The earlier all government, companies and everyone collectively address and implement laws to regulate the crime, the better the world will be.