Cyber Security Threats and Prevention

This assignment delves into the multifaceted world of cybersecurity, examining prevalent threats such as malware, ransomware, phishing attacks, cyberstalking, and terrorism. It explores how these threats exploit vulnerabilities and the devastating consequences they can inflict on individuals and businesses. Furthermore, the assignment emphasizes preventative measures and best practices to mitigate these risks, highlighting the importance of robust security protocols, user awareness, and ongoing vigilance in safeguarding against cybercrime.

Computer Crime and Digital Forensic
Cyber Crimes
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Table of Contents
Introduction......................................................................................................................................2
Discussion........................................................................................................................................2
Hacking........................................................................................................................................2
Theft.............................................................................................................................................3
Electronic Funds Transfer Crime................................................................................................4
Malicious Software......................................................................................................................4
Cyber Stalking..............................................................................................................................5
Terrorism and Extortion..............................................................................................................6
Telemarketing Fraud....................................................................................................................7
Denial of Service Attack...............................................................................................................7
Data Diddling..............................................................................................................................8
Spamming.....................................................................................................................................9
References......................................................................................................................................10
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Introduction
Nowadays, with the advancement of internet and its technologies, the issues of their security
such as hacking, phishing and other cyber-attacks have raised at large extent. These issues are
commonly known as cyber-crimes. Due to these cybercrimes, internet users are worried about
security and privacy of their information that is transferred over internet. The different types of
cyber-crimes are hacking, electronic fraud transfer crime, malicious software, telemarketing
fraud etc. The purpose of making this report is to emphasize on ten topic of cyber-crime and
provide detail discussion about those topics.
Discussion
Cyber-crime is committed over internet by professional hackers and invaders. It has very bad
impact on common user and business organizations those are fully concerned with internet to
perform their different business and other activities. Now in upcoming paragraphs, I will briefly
discuss each cyber-crime.
Hacking
It is one of vulnerable cyber-crimes. Through this cyber-crime, computer of an individual is
accessed by an unauthorized user without permission of that individual. This crime is done to
access the personal and confidential information from an individual’s system. There are various
hacking software available that are used by cyber-attackers (Banyeresdelpenedes.com, 2017).
Hacking is not an easy to do and sometimes, hackers do unexpected things such as system
breaking and stealing of a secure data. Moreover, it is surprising to believe that hacking can be
good or evil (TechRepublic, 2017). It can be a fraud of rights of people or can be done for safety
purposes of them. But in most of the cases, hacking has always put bad impact on internet users.
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There are several examples of vulnerable hacking cases that are concerned with large business
organizations such as eBay’s database hacking case is considered most vulnerable case of
hacking where most of the confidential information is accessed from company’s computer by
obtaining its secured password. In this way there are various other companies exist those have
already encountered this issue (Geek.com, 2017). It is commonly seen that hackers mostly try to
hack banking and e-commerce websites that are used by users for money transactions. Therefore,
I can say that to get prevention from hacking, secure software solutions should be used that can
protect system from unauthorized access. This is required when our computer is connected with
internet.
Theft
Theft is also a harmful cyber-crime. While committing this digital crime, copyrights are violated
by a person. It is commonly seen that while downloading movies, music, video, e-books and any
other digital material copyrights are broken by users and it is unethical form of accessing
information from internet. This cyber theft is also known as online piracy. This piracy has
influence on many people, especially in film industry it hurts emerging artists as well as
established artists. Here I would like to give an example of Hollywood Studio where financial
backing was implemented to track illegal streams and downloads. From outcomes of this
process, loss of millions of dollars was estimated. This cyber-crime of online piracy so much
hurts independent creators who do struggle for making a particular movie, videos and other
digital material (Granados, 2017). It is commonly seen that how uTorrent is used to download
movies, videos etc. by using hacking techniques and it is considered as theft of digital data.
Moreover, in case of music industry, a video album is produced with hefty cost and due to online
theft, a creator bear heavy loss. It is very important to fight against internet piracy, otherwise it
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will become difficult for people to survive. Not at the end of a particular industry but also at end
of lawmakers, online piracy should be abolished. This is a serious crime that must not be
supported by people.
Electronic Funds Transfer Crime
In list of vulnerable cybercrimes, electronic funds transfer crime is also included. Under this
digital crime, the information about an individual’s credit cards, bank accounts, social security
and other confidential information about their debits and credits is accessed by an unauthorized
person without permission of owner. This way of obtaining information is form of hacking that
results in financial losses and also demolishes credit history of a person. In most of cases, this
electronic funds transfer crime is committed during cash transactions that are commonly done by
people through e-commerce and e-banking services (A Sophisticated Approach to Detect Email
Frauds, 2016). According to analysis, dramatic rise has seen in this cyber-crime and it is
commonly known as social engineering fraud. There are several people who have become victim
of this electronic funds transfer crime and law enforcement agencies have received various
reports of this fraud. To commit this crime, a fraud scheme is implemented and under this
scheme legitimate superficial emails or other digital communication channels are used by
hackers to obtain the identity of people without their permission. To implement this fraud
scheme, schemers target specific language that is used for all online transactions. In this way,
schemers have different tools to do this digital crime. The main reason of increasing electronic
fraud is inappropriate usage of its prevention techniques and lack of awareness among people.
Malicious Software
Besides above discussed digital crimes, malicious software is also a vulnerable cyber-crime. It is
basically an internet-based software which is used to disrupt the network. The malicious software
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has potential to steal confidential information from system. Moreover, it also causes damage to
other software that exist into the system. There are different types of malicious software that are
used by cyber-criminals to damage the computer systems and networks of its users. But
ransomware is a dangerous form of malicious software that has potential to locks up the files on
computer, encrypt them and to damage those files (Press, 2017). According to analysis, I got to
know that malicious software has three major types such as adware, riskware and pornware. The
biggest threat of adware malicious software is that these are able to hack the system and can
collect confidential data that is related to host computer and this data may include IP address of
user, browser, most visited sites and used operating systems. On flip side, the type riskware is
basically concerned with legitimate programs that can be used for vulnerable attacks. This type
of malicious software includes IRC client programs, password utilities, telnet and proxy. In case
of pornware malicious software, it causes contents that are related to pornography and it is
displayed on users systems. These software programs are installed into system with approval of
user, but a user cannot understand that it is malicious for his system and gives permission to
them to enter into system (GIERSZEWSKI, 2016).
Cyber Stalking
This kind of cyber-crime is also known as online harassment. In this crime, various illegal online
messages or emails are send to people and due to this crime, targeted people have to face various
problems of stealing information. Cyber-Stalking is also known as online stalking. It is basically
defined as usage of internet technology to harass someone. There are some characteristics of
Cyber-Stalking such as false accusations, monitoring, identity theft, threats and data destruction.
Moreover, this crime is also related to exploitation of minors. The impact of cyber stalking can
be terrible (Lacroxin, 2017). It can destroy credit, careers, self-image, friendships and even
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confidence. When cyber-stalking is combined with real-world stalking, then it can cause physical
danger. This is really a serious matter and it is properly analyzed that victims of domestic
violence are mostly considered as cyber-stalking victims. In cyber-stalking, cyberstalkers mostly
prefer to use spyware software that is helpful to monitor everything that happens on user’s
computer or cell phone. It is a tremendous source of power and information for cyber-stalkers.
This digital crime of cyber-stalking is a serious offence and it is necessary to find resolution of
this problem of cyber-stalking. One of the anti-stalking tips is management of good password
and security. It is mandatory for every user to change passwords at frequent basis. Furthermore,
the care over physical access of computer and web-enabled devices is also required because
hardware and software devices are also used by cyber-stalkers to monitor victims (Shpantzer,
2017).
Terrorism and Extortion
This digital crime encourage terrorism activities. Through this cybercrime, a number of
individual and protest groups try to hack the certified web pages of different governmental and
commercial organizations. On governmental and enterprise related websites, hefty amount of
confidential information is stored and this information should be secured. To achieve this goal,
better security measurements are required. All terror groups that are involved in this digital crime
of extortion, they have motive to get money from transactions of business enterprises. The lack
of awareness about this issue may cause several issues for chief security officer of enterprise.
Furthermore, the violence against personal and corporate assets can also occur to large extent.
There are several countries that are influenced by terrorism and extortion digital crime and
Nigeria is one of those countries. The Nigerian terror group MEND was notorious among people
for its extortive acts and kidnappings. The reduction of this terror task should be done at priority
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basis. To do this, the support at country’s government, business, labor and civic entities and non-
governmental institutions is required. Besides this, IT users should also need to aware about
cyber terror attacks and their impacts, so that appropriate solution can be implemented to get
better prevention. In banking sector where various transactions are done by users, there high
level security is required to stop terror and extortion cyber-crimes.
Telemarketing Fraud
This fraud of telemarketing is considered a simple but vulnerable digital crime. In this crime, an
unknown person calls the victim, makes a false statement to provide best offers to the victim
after paying money to the caller. The wide range of scams are covered in this scam such as won
prize for foreign tour by submitting your personal detail and some amount of money. Some
victims accepts this request and submit their personal information with bank details. Further,
scammers use this information to access your bank accounts. Telemarketing fraud has raised to
large extent and it has become necessary to get rid of this problem. The recognition of
telemarketing fraud is difficult, so here I would like to suggest some schemes for getting
prevention (Findlaw, 2017). The prevention is registration of mobile or home numbers with the
particular registry of National Do Not Call. This is because, telemarketers are not allowed to call
on this number and any call from this number consider as scam. Another solution is that,
whenever a person receives any call from telemarketers then he or she should not provide
personal information to caller. But if an individual is interested into given offer then he or she
can ask caller to send information about offer by email to make decision later. Moreover, do not
take pressure to make decision in hurry, because in telemarketing fraud caller always wants you
to make quick decision (Kulkarni, 2016).
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Denial of Service Attack
This digital crime is also considered as very harmful and by committing this crime a cyber-
criminal can deny access of server from users. Eventually, cyber-criminals do virus attack on
server to stop access of information that is available on server’s website and its database. Here
criminals mostly put their focus on web server of a particular website and send several requests
to it at a time (Ydstie, 2017). Due to this, maximum bandwidth of the website is used by
criminals that slow down the website. Moreover, this website also becomes unavailable for some
time for its users. DDoS attack is mostly implemented on application layer of network by
hackers. This cyber-crime has put influence over business enterprises through large-scale attacks.
However, these organizations are using security tools to get prevention but still DDoS attack is
frightening applications and business. While implementing denial of service attack, malware
virus is used which is considered most harmful DDoS attack. To get rid of DDoS attack, better
defense solutions are necessary to use by IT users. These solutions should be in proactive and
reactive mode which is basically based on preference of business. It would be helpful for
appropriate protection. If I talk about network layers, then not only at application layer but also
at other layers such as network or session layers, security should be maintained.
Data Diddling
This digital crime is related to modification of data without any authorization for that data. This
is done with the help of virus programs those have potential to change the system’s data that is
entered by a user. Data diddling is considered as common method of computer related crimes.
The modifications in data occurs before, during and after inputting the data. The most commonly
affected things by data diddling are banks, payrolls, credit records, school transcripts and other
forms that require data processing. There are several cases of data diddling have registered in
cyber law. As we know in banks and other online businesses, confidential information is
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transferred over internet. Therefore, hackers mostly put emphasize on these transactions to steal
or modify this information. Due to amendments in amount and other personal inputs, heavy loss
are encountered by users. To get rid of this problem, it is necessary to maintain security at users’
end. They should concern with their security experts to sustain high level security of their
network, database and computer. Every potential security tools such as anti-virus, use of strong
passwords and security of network layer etc. should be used by users. It is responsibility of
system administrator to check that only authorized persons should have permission to access
information from of different departments in an organization.
Spamming
It is also a harmful cyber-crime activity that is performed by cyber criminals to access
confidential information from internet users by sending fake emails to them. Spam email is
known as junk mail that sends a message to victim with a web link or some business proposals
by spammer. Multiple emails are collected from different websites by criminals and on those
emails proposals are sent. When user receives spam email then he clicks on link that results to
install malware into system and user redirects to phishing website. Spamming has become a
biggest threat for internet users and it is an easier and common method to collect information by
using emails (Jain, 2016). It is commonly seen in inbox that various spam emails have received
from unknown entities and all these have purpose to collect personal and financial information of
a user. Spamming emails not only steal information but also damage system files if they contain
virus. The best way to get rid of this problem is that do not open spam emails and just discard
them with one click. Otherwise, sometimes with opening of spam emails, virus can directly
attack on system. Besides this, by using email filters, emails can be squeezed. Filters can restrict
to enter spam emails into user’s account and security of account will remain for long time.
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