Computer CrimeMustBeGeek

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Computers and information systems have become the indispensible part of the business. There is no surprise that these computer systems have become the target of criminals. Computer crime can have significant impact on businesses and institutions. The crimes have been divided into two categories.

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Computer Crime

Computer as tool

Criminals use computer as a medium to carry out their crime. Since the computer users are increasing day by day. It can be powerful tool for criminals. They can commit many crimes like child pornography, fraud, theft, etc. These days frauds have become very popular. Criminals send fake mail to the victim. Criminals send mail to victim’s account in the name of his/her friend, stating some story. They ask to help by asking them to send money to their bank accounts. Here the attacker simply used computer system to commit fraud. Similarly another example is fishing, where an attacker build the duplicate fake site of original official site. Attackers use different techniques to let users to log in to fake site and get their usernames/passwords.

Computer as the target of crime

As computer systems have become the basic requirement of most of the businesses, it has also become the centre of attraction for criminals. Non ethical hackers and crackers are now constantly targeting computer systems and network infrastructure of the organizations to commit crime. Unlike computer crime as tool, here computer is the target or center point of attackers. Here computer system is the victim. To make the computer system victim attacker tend to use viruses, Trojans, hacking, identify theft, social engineering and so on to achieve their goal.

Experienced hackers use various tools available to initiate their attack. They might also have their own tools and systems to get into attack business. Some of the tools available are Nmap, Nessus, Wireshark, Cain and Abel, and many others. Hackers also build their own community to make attack more efficient and powerful. Hacking community like Lulsec, Anonymous have become nightmare for network administrators. These groups of hackers might have their own algorithm to initiate the attack.