Cyber Crime in Pakistan: Issues, Challenges, and Countermeasures

This research paper analyzes the different types of cybercrimes in Pakistan, the issues and challenges faced by organizations, and the preventive measures that can be taken to resist cyber-attacks.

Running head: CYBER SECURITY
Cyber Crime in Pakistan: Issues, Challenges, and Countermeasures
Name of student-
Name of University-
Author’s Note-

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Table of Contents
Introduction......................................................................................................................................2
Background......................................................................................................................................2
Aim and Objective...........................................................................................................................3
Purpose of Study..............................................................................................................................3
Research Questions..........................................................................................................................4
Literature Review............................................................................................................................4
Reasons of cyber-attack in Pakistan............................................................................................4
Types of Cyber-Attack in Pakistan..............................................................................................4
Countermeasures taken to Prevent Cyber-attack.........................................................................5
Methodology....................................................................................................................................6
Summary..........................................................................................................................................7
References........................................................................................................................................8

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Introduction
Cybercrime is mainly defined as the crime in which computer is considered as an object
of the crime that is to be conducted which generally includes phishing, spamming, and hacking.
Cybercrime is a tool that can commit many offenses (Awan and Memon 2016). The cybercrime
consists of wide range of activities and are basically broken into two categories. The crimes
which targets the computer devices or networks. These crimes includes viruses as well as DoS
(Denial of Service) attacks. The crimes that uses the network of computers for proceeding
criminal activities. These includes crimes such as phishing, fraud, and cyberstalking.
Background
The effect of cybercrime is increasing tremendously in Pakistan. As recorded by the
cybercrime unit of Pakistan, there are 62 cases which were reported in the unit in the year 2010,
87 cases in the year 2011, as well as 75 in the 2014. There are more than 312 cases which were
registered in many categories related to cyber-crime. The rate of cybercrime has increased in the
year 2014 in comparison with 2013. There is saying that “Nip the evil in the Bud” which states
that all the stakeholders should urgently chalk out some preventive measures or some strategies
for controlling the increasing rate of cybercrime (Munir and Gondal 2017). There should be
training provided to all the employees employed in IT department and there should be proper
preventive measures for adding the risks to the people. For making the people aware of
cybercrime such as spamming, hacking, harassment and phishing, there is need of proper training
in the sector of Information Technology for preventing cyber-attacks.

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Aim and Objective
The main aim of this research paper is to find out the different types of cybercrimes
performing in Pakistan and to analyze the different kinds of causes, issues and counter measures
associated with this fact.
The objective of this research paper are stated below:
 To study all different types of cyber-attacks Pakistan id facing currently
 To study the main issues as well as challenges faced by the different organizations due to
the practice of the cyber-attacks in Pakistan
 To investigate the preventive measures that can be taken to prevent the applications of
Internet Technology in the organizations of Pakistan
Purpose of Study
The use of ICT (Information and Communication Technologies) are increasing day by
day in Pakistan in the last decade. There are 75,00,0001 numbers of internet users in Pakistan
that has grown to 5,501.2 % in between 2000 to 2005. The internet technology recently less
penetrates and are needed to compete with the international standards. The increasing cyber
security threat is affecting the IT service of Pakistan in recent days. The main purpose of this
study is to analyze the effect of cyber security threat in Pakistan and the issues and challenges
that are faced by the country. There are also some preventive measures that helps to lessen the
attack in cyber sector. Pakistan has adopted many preventive measures for cyber boundaries and
the purpose of this study is those preventive measures.
Research Questions
The research questions that are addressed in this research paper are:

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 What are the different types of cyber-attacks that are performing at present in Pakistan?
 What are the main issues and challenges faced by the different organizations due to the
practice of the cyber-attacks?
 What are the preventive measures that can be taken to resist the cyber-attacks?
Literature Review
Reasons of cyber-attack in Pakistan
Ullah et al. (2015), stated that because of the increasing adoption of the services of
internet, there is an increase of interaction and government employees many processes for
transforming all the major services of online services. Deploying the service that are internet
based at the government level has gradually increased possibilities of the security measures of
sabotage systems from external as well as internal sources. Awan and Memon (2016) has also
agreed with the fact that the cyber terrorists generally creates integrity, confidentiality, as well as
availability attack on the cyber-services or on the services related to government service.
Types of Cyber-Attack in Pakistan
Munir and Gondal (2017), stated there are security, reliability, as well as resilience on the
cyber asset of Pakistan and the government services of Pakistan. Agreeing with the fact Altayar
(2017), stated that the big challenges that are faced by the cyber-security experts because of the
increasing number of cyber threats attacks in Pakistan. The types the cyber threats that are faced
by Pakistan are listed below.
Cyber-Attacks Infection Cause of Infection
Trojan Horse Criminal tasks and
Malicious tasks
Phishing and Downloading

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Frauds Unlawful gain or secure
unfair
Cheating on a person
Denial of Services Unauthorized control or
access of data (Mohammed
2016)
Caused by network
Cyber Harassment Cyber stalking Internet
Intrusion An illegal act that has taken
possession without any
permission
Caused by network
Table 1: Cyber Attacks of Pakistan
(Source: Awan and Memon 2016)
Countermeasures taken to Prevent Cyber-attack
Awan et al. (2016), protecting the data of IT applications, the European countries mostly
use algorithm of SCAP (Security Content Automation Protocol) for the National Vulnerability
database (NVD) that enables data for automation of security, vulnerability management as well
as compliance. Shaukat et al. (2017), stated that hackers are those who tries to hack all the
confidential information of the cyber-systems. The official of cyber squad should also implement
those preventive measure against cyber-attack.
From the analysis of Shamsi and Nasir (2016), it can be studied that as Pakistan is a
developing country in which the implementation of the cyber-attack services are under the
development. Many security measures are taken by Pakistan and yet to be taken more.

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Methodology
For studying the details of the cyber-attack in Pakistan and its issues, challenges as well
as preventive measures, many books as well as journals will be reviewed by the researcher from
various blogs, library, and websites available on Internet (Riaz and Riaz 2015). For gathering the
information, the research philosophy that will be used in post positivism philosophy. The
research design that will be used in the research paper descriptive research design which will
support possibilities of selected topics from the internet.
The main data collection method that will help to carry out this research paper by the
researcher is primary method of data collection (Memon et al., 2015). For studying the recent
trend of cyber-attack, the best data collection procedure is primary data collection in which a
questionnaire will be made and employees of different organizations are to be interviewed
regarding the difficulties they face because of the cyber-attack in Pakistan. There will also be
some data that will be collected by secondary data collection method from different journal
accounts, books, and blogs or website articles. The data that have been studied for this research
study should be related to recent cyber-attack and will also state the prevention method about
how to mitigate or overcome those cyber-attacks. The data analysis method that will be done in
this research paper is mixed approach of data analysis method which will include qualitative as
well as quantitative method of data collection.
Summary
The criminals related with cyber-crime, computer technology is used to get an access to
the personal information, secrets of business trade or using of internet for malicious purposes or
exploitative purposes. The criminals in cybercrime also can use the computers for the purpose of

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communication as well as document or for data storage. The criminals who perform the illegal
activities are referred to as the hackers in the world of technology. This research proposal mainly
elaborates the details of the cyber-attack that is performing in Pakistan recently. Different types
of cyber-attacks are described in this research proposal that had been encountered by Pakistan
and the ways to mitigate them is also elaborated.

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References
Altayar, M.S., 2017, March. A comparative study of anti-cybercrime laws in the Gulf
Cooperation Council countries. In Anti-Cyber Crimes (ICACC), 2017 2nd International
Conference on (pp. 148-153). IEEE.
Awan, J. and Memon, S., 2016, January. Threats of cyber security and challenges for Pakistan.
In International Conference on Cyber Warfare and Security (p. 425). Academic Conferences
International Limited.
Awan, J.H., Memon, S., Shah, M.H. and Awan, F.H., 2016, July. Security of eGovernment
services and challenges in Pakistan. In SAI Computing Conference (SAI), 2016 (pp. 1082-1085).
IEEE.
Memon, S., Mahar, S., Dhomeja, L.D. and Pirzado, F., 2015, June. Prospects and challenges for
social media in Pakistan. In Cyber Situational Awareness, Data Analytics and Assessment
(CyberSA), 2015 International Conference on(pp. 1-5). IEEE.
Mohammed, F., 2016. PECA 2015: A Critical Analysis of Pakistan's Proposed Cybercrime
Bill. UCLA J. Islamic & Near EL, 15, p.71.
Munir, A. and Gondal, M.T., 2017. Cyber Media and Vulnerability: A discourse on cyber laws
and a probe on victimization of cybercrimes in Pakistan. Global Media Journal: Pakistan
Edition, 10(2).
Riaz, A. and Riaz, A., 2015, November. Causes and consequences of cybercrimes: An
exploratory study of Pakistan. In Anti-Cybercrime (ICACC), 2015 First International
Conference on (pp. 1-5). IEEE.

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Shamsi, J.A. and Nasir, Z., 2016. Unleashing the Pakistan Software Industry: Growth Prospects
and Challenges. IT Professional, 18(5), pp.12-14.
Shaukat, K., Rubab, A., Shehzadi, I. and Iqbal, R., 2017. A Socio-Technological analysis of
Cyber Crime and Cyber Security in Pakistan. Transylvanian Review, 1(3).
Ullah, S., Amir, M., Khan, M., Asmat, H. and Habib, K., 2015, November. Pakistan and cyber
crimes: Problems and preventions. In Anti-Cybercrime (ICACC), 2015 First International
Conference on (pp. 1-6). IEEE.