ABSTRACT
The COVID-19 pandemic accelerated many organisations' reliance on the Internet, with schools, companies, and government agencies, among other institutions, all shifting their operations online in a relatively short period of time. This sudden shift created opportunities for cybercriminals, as did the burden on the healthcare sector, the rush for unemployment benefits, and the desire for up-to-date information about outbreaks and health precautions. This chapter examines the trends in cybercrime during the COVID-19 pandemic that were spurred by these changes, as well as the mitigation measures implemented by government and private industry stakeholders to help protect critical infrastructure and online operations. It argues that the nature of cybercrime and the most common forms of criminal activity did not change substantially during the pandemic, but rather that criminals' focus on whom to target and how to exploit evolving current events enabled them to wield existing criminal tools to greater effect, and potentially also at greater scale, though reliable statistics on the frequency and size of cybercrimes are scarce. Finally, the chapter considers how these trends in cybercrime forced private organisations and governments to undertake new cybersecurity measures and programs and whether the long-term effects of the pandemic might actually include stronger cybersecurity if these efforts continue past the end of the public health crisis. © 2023 the authors.
ABSTRACT
While there are no new frauds, internet technology provides new opportunities for fraudsters by facilitating volumes of attacks that law enforcement then struggles to address. Moreover, since context can affect how potential victims respond to frauds, crisis context influences how fraudsters design frauds. This article assesses fraudsters' fraud design strategies during two external crisis events that impacted Australia: The Black Summer Bushfires that occurred from September 2019 to March 2020 and the onset and first year of the COVID-19 pandemic that occurred from January 2020 through January 2021. Targets, during these crises, were more likely to be vulnerable according to Steinmetz's model victim for social engineering framework. This study shows that, in both crises, fraudsters deployed the social engineering techniques of "authority” and "scarcity,” techniques that are more likely to be successful based solely on initial contact. Fraudsters designed their requests to be easily actioned and crafted their scams to reference very recent events as the external crisis events evolved. Thus, they targeted broad audiences with minimal personal involvement. Furthermore, this study shows that fraudsters, when disseminating their scams via social media outlets, attempted to build "social proof” to expand their potential victim pool to include the marks' social circles.
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The substantially revised third edition of The Handbook of Security provides the most comprehensive analysis of scholarly security debates and issues to date. It reflects the developments in security technology, the convergence of the cyber and security worlds, and the fact that security management has become even more business focused. It covers newer topics like terrorism, violence, and cybercrime through various offence types such as commercial robbery and bribery. This handbook comprises mostly brand new chapters and a few thoroughly revised chapters, with discussions of the impact of the pandemic. It includes contributions from some of the world's leading scholars from an even broader geographic scale to critique the way security is provided and managed. It speaks to professionals working in security and students studying security-related courses. Chapter 5 is available open access under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License via link.springer.com. © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022. All rights reserved.
ABSTRACT
With the increasing internet accessibility in India and the challenges posed by the Covid-19 pandemic, the practice of virtual court hearing has been accelerated in India. The virtual Court acts as an effective means to conduct Court proceedings, debarring geographical barriers and uplifting Courtroom functioning's productivity. Along with the practical applicability of virtual court hearings in India comes the glitches or challenges posed by the virtual hearing of matters. Nonetheless, the necessity of physical hearing of matters cannot be ignored. In pursuance of this, arguments in favor of reverting towards physical hearings after the pandemic situation ends are being posed before the Indian Judiciary, which negates the applicability of virtual courtrooms. Thereby, this article aims to analyze the applicability, necessity and efficacy of virtual court hearings and the challenges posed by Virtual Court hearings in India.Copyright © 2020 Ubiquity Press. All rights reserved.
ABSTRACT
During the COVID-19 pandemic, the number of technology-facilitated crimes against children worldwide has increased substantially and become one of the most serious crime problems. Due to these considerations, there is a lack of large-scale systematic reviews investigating Cybercrime in and of itself could be challenging to investigate in comparison to traditional ones due to the elusiveness of the cyber realm. Specifically, investigating internet crimes against children comes with specific challenges. These offenses target vulnerable children who are less likely to realize their victimization, lowering the probability of reporting to the proper authorities. With these obstacles in mind, this research study utilizes data information regarding the characteristics of online CSAM users and their practices to inform law enforcement, parents, and the public for preventative and strategic purposes. Furthermore, this study diagnoses the significant challenges of investigating technology-facilitated crimes against children by examining how the current criminal justice system responds to these incidents. The policy recommendations discussed offer a holistic lens for highlighting this critical issue and implementing practical and proactive training solutions for law enforcement and the public.
ABSTRACT
This paper provides the first exploration of the online distribution of fake Australian COVID-19 vaccine certificates. Drawing on a collection of 2589 posts between five distributors and their community members on the alt-tech platform Gab, this study gathers key insights into the mechanics of illicit vaccine certificate distribution. The qualitative findings in this research demonstrate the various motivations and binding ideologies that underpinned this illicit distribution (e.g. anti-vaccine and anti-surveillance motivations); the unique cybercultural aspects of this online illicit network (e.g. 'crowdsourcing' the creation of fake vaccine passes); and how the online community was used to share information on the risks of engaging in this illicit service, setting the appropriate contexts of using fake vaccine passes, and the evasion of guardians in offline settings. Implications for future research in cybercrime, illicit networks, and organised crime in digital spaces are discussed.
ABSTRACT
The World Health Organization (WHO) declared the COVID-19 outbreak as a global public health emergency of international concern. The pandemic has increased the suffering of humanity enormously. Loss of income and employment opportunities is the massive adverse effect of the pandemic. Due care needs to be taken by the top-level management of every sector to understand the adverse effect and causes or problems and to build the measures to overcome from the pandemic. The researcher had attempted and discussed the themes viz., areas of management, financial institutions cyber-crime, economic notion, human depression, school and colleges closures, returning of migrant laborers to identify the constraints and to come up with the remedial measures to overcome those constraints and how to build a new advanced society of Post COVID-19 era. © 2022 Scrivener Publishing LLC.
ABSTRACT
The recent covid-19 pandemic created a barrier to every activity that needed physical interaction and involvement, especially in the judiciary. Careful research of some courts in Nigeria shown that case records are still been manually processed and stored and some courts operate a semi-digital and semi-manual processing pattern, which also has its own shortcoming of preprocessing manual records and converting them into digital records and physical presence is required to access court records. This research develops a secure electronic Cybercrime Cases Database System (eCCDBS), for prosecuted cybercrime in the judicial service in Nigeria. The system will provide an efficient method for collecting, retrieving, preserving, and management of court case records. The Rapid Application Development (RAD) methodology is used for the system development, because of its speed and time friendliness and can be easily restructured to meet the client's requirement at any point in time during the development life span. RAD can also present a prototype of the final system software to the client. Access control mechanism and secure password hashing were used to ensure the security of the system. The system was implemented and evaluated through deployment and found to have functioned according to the specification. The application subunits of records' creation, submission, modification, deletion, retrieval, and storage functioned effectively. Hence this system provides a secure online repository specifically for cybercrime case records that have elements of confidentiality, integrity and availability.
ABSTRACT
Cybercrime is a crime committed using equipment connected to the internet. One of the cybercrimes that occured during the COVID-19 pandemic was the spread hoaxes about the Covid-19 vaccine which caused panic in society. Signal Messenger is one of the social media that has become a trending topic since the number of personal data security issues and the emergence of end-to-end encryption features. This research aims to find digital evidence on Signal Messenger application installed on the perpetrator's Android smartphone. This research uses Belkasoft, Magnet AXIOM, and MOBILedit Forensic Express tools and implements the Digital Forensics Research Workshop (DFRWS) framework in each stage of the research experiment. The research was carried out according to the case scenario with 11 predetermined parameters. Digital evidence is found from the Signal Messenger application: application information, account information, chat, pictures, videos, contacts, and stickers. The results of this research indicate that Belkasoft Evidence Center forensic tool is better, with an accuracy rate of 78.69%, while Magnet AXIOM is 26.23% and MOBILedit Forensic Express is 9.84%. The results of this research can be used as a reference for other forensic researchers/experts in handling similar crime cases on the Signal Messenger application to get better results. © 2022 International Information and Engineering Technology Association. All rights reserved.
ABSTRACT
COVID-19 affected millions of people and organizations from all sectors and social classes, contributing to the proliferation of social, economic, technological and financial risks, increasing cybercrime and financial fraud in the business field. These illicit activities took leadership due to the adoption of digital media that the organizations used to be able to continue their operations. Therefore, the goal of this research was to evaluate the perception of cybercrime and financial fraud in Ecuadorian public and private sector organizations in COVID-19. For this, a descriptive study was carried out, under a cross-sectional quantitative approach, using the chi-square statistic as a means of association of the variables. The results showed that the manipulation of economic data and fraud was the main cybercrime incurred during the pandemic, with financial statement fraud being the largest scheme executed by the perpetrators. The internal control and internal audit functions were identified as the main lines of prevention and assurance against these criminal activities. © 2023, Universidad del Zulia. All rights reserved.
ABSTRACT
The Covid-19 has had heavily affected the global economy making several countries to a standstill. During this crisis, many people have started making use of social media platforms as a method of practicing social distancing. With this thing said, it is just the right environment for cyber attackers to conduct fraud by taking advantage of people's fear and widespread panic. This paper examines the different types of cyber-attacks conducted during this pandemic in India, with an increased time spent on social media by misleading people into releasing sensitive personal information. The paper also discusses the level of cybercrime awareness among the Indian citizens and preventive measures taken by them, which has become of utmost importance during this pandemic. Further, the research focuses on the statistical analysis, which is conducting by considering the hypothesis for the interdependence between the preventive steps taken, total duration utilized on the social platform, and the likelihood of online victimization. Additionally, future work related to the paper will determine the changes in the number of cybercrimes post Covid-19 pandemic. © 2023 American Institute of Physics Inc.. All rights reserved.
ABSTRACT
To design preventive policy measures for email phishing, it is helpful to be aware of the phishing schemes and trends that are currently applied. How phishing schemes and patterns emerge and adapt is an ongoing field of study. Existing phishing works already reveal a rich set of phishing schemes, patterns, and trends that provide insight into the mechanisms used. However, there seems to be limited knowledge about how email phishing is affected in periods of social disturbance, such as COVID-19 in which phishing numbers have quadrupled. Therefore, we investigate how the COVID-19 pandemic influences the phishing emails sent during the first year of the pandemic. The email content (header data and html body, excl. attachments) is evaluated to assess how the pandemic influences the topics of phishing emails over time (peaks and trends), whether email campaigns correlate with momentous events and trends of the COVID-19 pandemic, and what hidden content revealed. This is studied through an in-depth analysis of the body of 500.000 phishing emails addressed to Dutch registered top-level domains collected during the start of the pandemic. The study reveals that most COVID-19 related phishing emails follow known patterns indicating that perpetrators are more likely to adapt than to reinvent their schemes.
ABSTRACT
Background: Rogue internet pharmacy networks are run by criminal opportunists-and the COVID-19 pandemic has provided the perfect opportunity for illegal online drug sellers to prey on fearful consumers. These criminals are not new to the game: they are simply targeting a novel disease. Purpose(s): This study establishes the prevalence and practices of websites being used for the illegal sale of prescription-only medicine marketed as a therapy for COVID-19, and calls on internet intermediaries to take action against these websites. Method(s): NABP identified hundreds of domain names (web addresses) that include key words related to COVID-19. Among them were dozens of illegal online pharmacies that were actively peddling prescription-only drugs marketed as COVID-19 treatments. Staff evaluated these sites and looked for commonalities. Result(s): In our review, we found the following: 1) most active websites have clear ties to known criminal networks;2) some newly-created COVID-specific websites redirect users to established rogue network sites;3) many domain names are clustered on "safe haven" registrars;and 4) the domain name registration information for almost all identified websites is anonymised, making it difficult for enforcement agencies to investigate these criminals. Conclusion(s): Numerous websites are indeed being registered and used illegally to sell prescription-only medicine marketed as a therapy for COVID-19. Internet intermediaries must implement long-term policies that will not only put a stop to COVID-19 related cybercrime but will also shut down rogue internet pharmacy networks for good.
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PurposeThis paper aims to investigate the potential challenges that governments in the Commonwealth Caribbean are likely to face combating crimes facilitated by the dark Web.Design/methodology/approachThe "lived experience” methodology guided by a contextual systematic literature review was used to ground the investigation of the research phenomena in the researchers' collective experiences working in, living in and engaging in research with governments in the Commonwealth Caribbean.FindingsThe two major findings emerging from the analysis are that jurisdictional and technical challenges are producing major hindrances to the creation of an efficient and authoritative legislative framework and the building of the capacity of governments in the Commonwealth Caribbean to confront the technicalities that affect systematic efforts to manage problems created by the dark Web.Practical implicationsThe findings indicate the urgency that authorities in the Caribbean region must place on reevaluating their administrative, legislative and investment priorities to emphasize cyber-risk management strategies that will enable their seamless and wholesome integration into this digital world.Originality/valueThe research aids in developing and extending theory and praxis related to the problematization of the dark Web for governments by situating the experiences of Small Island Developing States into the ongoing discourse.
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Revenge porn is the online publication on websites of explicit photographs or videos taken in intimate moments without the person's consent. It is a new form of gender-based violence, as the majority of victims are women. This phenomenon has been growing in recent years due to the increase in popularity and spread of social networks. Since the start of social distancing measures due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the problem has undoubtedly become more serious. The most affected groups are women and adolescents. Phenomena such as revenge porn and cyber-bullying are aberrant aspects of online relationships. Although different in their specificity, they have many elements in common, which, unfortunately, in some cases, have led to dramatic out-comes, pushing the victims to suicide. This contribution aims at fully framing the issue from a social point of view and outlining its legal characteristics with reference to the European and Italian legal framework, starting from the analysis of the data presented within the report presented on 24 November 2020 by the Italian Ministry of Justice, containing a statistical analysis of the impact in terms of diffusion of the revenge porn phenomenon one year after the entry into force of the law of 19 July 2019 (the so-called "Codice Rosso”), which introduced the specific crime of unlawful dissemination of sexually explicit images or videos. © 2022 Author(s).
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For a long time, optimization has been part of our lives and the most recent literature shows a tremendous increase of the number of articles using Revolutionary algorithms in particular Firefly algorithm (FA) and Genetic algorithm. This tendency can be observed nearly in all areas of Computer Sciences and Engineering domain. Some of them are hybridized with other techniques to discover better performance. In addition, literatures found that most of the cases that used (FA) and (GA) techniques have outperformed compare to other metaheuristic algorithms. And because of the extraordinary impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on society and business as a whole, the pandemic generated an increase in the number and range of cybercriminal attacks due to the extensive use of computer networks. As result, new risks have arisen, and improving the speed and accuracy of security mechanisms has become a critical need. The aim of this article is to give the main mechanisme of those approachs and their application alone and hybrided to solve cybercrime problems. © 2022 IEEE.
ABSTRACT
SIM swapping is a novel criminal modus operandi which uses copied SIM cards for the purpose of taking over a mobile service subscription and thereby accessing sensitive personal and financial data. Authorities around the world have reported a surge in SIM Swapping crimes, mainly driven by criminals taking advantage of the increasingly virtual lifestyle precipitated by the COVID-19 pandemic. This study examines related cases around the world, and categorizes them according to their specific modi operandi, as well as the initial responses of national authorities to this emerging crime. By analyzing the dynamics of this new crime trend, this study aims to propose preemptive and preventative measures to address this new threat. Research has identified three main steps in SIM Swapping crime: 1) personal data theft, 2) fraudulent copying of SIM card, and 3) exploitation of falsely-obtained mobile service for perpetration. Research has also found that the subscriber authentication procedure involved in replacing a SIM card is vulnerable to identity theft, especially in jurisdictions which have implemented eSIM. Therefore, it will be upon governments to enforce a stronger user authentication and information security regime for mobile carriers, introduce an online payment system devised with a data-sharing mechanism connecting mobile carriers and financial services, and raise public awareness on SIM Swapping and information security in general. © 2022 IEEE.
ABSTRACT
The spread of e-learning as an alternative to traditional or face-to-face education has faced many problems and challenges in general and ethical and legal challenges in particular. This study aims to measure students' awareness of the safe use of technology and its tools in e-learning that is consistent with ethical and legal standards. The study attempts to reveal the degree of awareness of students of the University of Jordan about electronic crimes related to e-learning and the legal procedures and penalties related to electronic crimes in e-learning. Quantitative research methods were used. A questionnaire was established and distributed to students enrolled in the following online courses: Ethics and Human Values, Communication Skills, and National Culture. Analysis of the data revealed that students had a high awareness about cybercrime due to the widespread use of the internet by students as it became an integral part of their daily lives. The degree of awareness of student about legal procedures and penalties related to electronic crimes in e-learning was medium. This indicates students' lack of awareness of the effectiveness of procedures and penalties for electronic crimes that can be applied in e-learning due to the rapid transition in the learning process at the University of Jordan from traditional learning to distance e-learning that was imposed during the Corona pandemic. Based on these findings, the study presented a set of recommendations that could be implemented to increase awareness and maximize the benefit of using e-learning.
ABSTRACT
Due to the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic, people are compelled to maintain social distance in all spheres of life, forcing people to adopt virtual mode of activity. Usage of social media and other internet activity has shot up in this period, and consequently, cybercrimes have also increased. If cybercrimes are reported, computer forensics analysts will examine the concerned website, online forum, or social media to find meticulous details about the cybercrime. But webpage content seen on the day may not be available on the next day. The contents of the webpage, which is the subject of crime, will be deleted or withdrawn, or deactivated to destroy evidence to escape from legal proceedings. The victims usually produce a screenshot of the webpage or image or video as a piece of evidence. But there is a distinct possibility of manipulating the offensive materials and it may not be considered a valid piece of evidence before the court of law. Such a scenario requires a forensic technique that should acquire the content of the webpage before it is removed from web site to maintain the authenticity of captured data. So, we are proposing an automated system for the forensic acquisition of a website that will effectively capture all content from the live website and make it useful for forensic investigation and may be produced before the court as valid evidence of cybercrime. © 2022 IEEE.