Cyber Crime
Internet based online crime or
cyber crime as it is commonly
known is ( unfortunately ) flourishing simply because it is successful and
therefore profitable.
Cybercrime can include
identity theft, fraud, a variety of rip
off scams ( phishing ),
paedophilia (
chat room "grooming", cyber stalking or child pornography ), industrial espionage or
sabotage ( hacking ) and even terrorism.
Reporting Cyber Crime in Australia
Australian Federal Police
For matters involving children, contact the
Australian Federal Police Online Child Sex Exploitation Team or in an
emergency 'phone 000
For general information technology crimes, eg. unauthorised access, denial of service attacks, etc, contact the Australian High Tech Crime Centre or 'phone (02) 6246 2101 if genuine urgency exists. (you must supply contact details).
Hosted by the Australian Federal
Police themselves, the
AHTCC
website also contains lots of expert advice
and information - worth a look just for that.
Crime Stoppers Australia
Report ANY crime anonymously
'phone Crime Stoppers
Australia 1800 333 000, Tasmania 1800 005 555
Incidents reported to these organisations will never be trivialised. Your seemingly insignificant report may be a piece of a large puzzle.
Accuracy and detail are important so provide as much relevant information as you can.
Virtual Global Taskforce
The Virtual Global Taskforce is an international collaborative organisation dedicated to making the internet safe for kids -
Collectively these people are the global cyber police, through their website they are very contactable and are having a real impact.
Protect Yourself from Cyber Crime
Spam - phishing
The most commonly encountered form of cyber crime is a type of
spam email known
as
phishing.
Without exception the sole purpose of such
emails is
identity theft leading to fraud.
This may involve a technique known as
spoofing which makes an email appear as though it's been sent from a trusted source.
See an image of a real phishing email. ( opens in a new window ).
This one has been made to look like an authentic email from PayPal® -
it was not.
Another technique used to deceive the unwary is
pharming where a trusted website is mimicked ( usually very accurately ),
entering your login details just as you normally would simply passes this information on to
whoever is running the bogus site..
Reminder :-
dire consequences and / or excessive urgency are a dead giveaway that the "
renewal" or "request for confirmation" etc is bogus.
Identity theft
Protect your financial identity is a new website
which covers this subject extensively.
Take their quiz, you might not be as safe as you think you are.
Dangers for Children on the Internet
Here in Australia this rather unsavoury subject is covered extensively and far more expertly
than I could by the good people at
NetAlert.
I urge anyone whose kids are internet users to read the advice given on the
NetAlert website.
Also take a look at their latest initiative "Think
U Know", it emphasises the fact that whilst kids might be smart, well
educated and seriously techno savvy, they're still kids and probably not nearly
as "street smart" as they think they are.
Internationally, Wired Safety is a global volunteer organisation dedicated to making the world wide web a safer place to be. TeenAngels, a division of wired safety, is a group of ( you guessed it ) teenagers who present the "online safety" message to their peers, their website has a definite advantage because the advice isn't coming from adults.
Quick Quiz
Which of the following is POTENTIALLY the greatest obstacle to successful cybercrime ?
-
Law enforcement
-
Leading edge software encryption
-
Sophisticated firewalls and anti-spam / virus / trojan / worm software
-
None of the above
Correct answer - none of the above
The 1st three are ( of course ) essential, however far and away the greatest POTENTIAL obstacle to successful Cyber Crime is YOU ! No amount of protection is of any use if you reply to a cleverly presented scam email for example. Also the possible consequences of allowing children unrestricted access to the internet can be expensive or even unthinkable and unfortunately all too common. Reminder - don't rely solely on search engine filtering.
Vigilance underpinned by educated awareness is paramount ( no use trying to be careful if you don't know what hazards exist ).
Links
Australian Government :
- Stay Smart Online
- Scamwatch
- Dept of Communications Information Technology and the Arts
- Australian Media and Communications Authority
- Australian Institute of Criminology - cybercrime
- Consumers Online
Others :
