Cybercrime

Cybercrime is illegal/unlawful acts done over the internet, which involves crimes such as thefts, destruction of information, sharing files/downloads and funds through computers. Cyber criminals use different skill-set methods depending on the type of crime or goals that they set for themselves. Cybercrime criminals use phishing and pharming to lure users to fake sites that look legitimate to users and ask for personal, credit and other information. Cybercrimes affects many people worldwide and continues to thrive as technology continues to excel. It is almost impossible to be 100% safe from cybercrime but preventative steps are being molded and enforced on all cyber users.

The extent of cybercrimes being committed to the general public and businesses of the United States mostly goes unreported to local, state, or federal authorities because many of the cybercrimes have low-visibility acts. The internet has become a favorite tool to the international crimes. The increase of these crimes is growing by the use of IT systems and the internet. The extent of cybercrimes is destabilizing not only to the United States but to the world’s economy. The growing threat of cybercrime has been represented to be a significant threat to financial and trust systems; banking, stock marketing, and credit card services, to which the economy depends on. With the growing threat the United States is unprepared to meet the current security needs in a timely matter. The United States has a critical shortage of investigators with the proper expertise to analyze the potential digital evidence of the increasing amount of crimes being committed over the internet.

There are many different agencies that help to organize some preventive ways to control cybercrimes. Within the federal government there are four departments, which help with cybercrimes. The Department of Justice (DOJ), the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), and the Federal Trade Commission (FTS). These departments all have...